Seattle City Council Select Budget Committee Session II 11/18/20

We are in session two of the continued select budget committee meeting.

Today is November 18, 2020. The time is 2 o'clock p.m.

I'm Teresa Mosqueda, chair of the select budget committee.

The select budget committee is back in order.

Will the clerk please call the roll?

Council Member Sawant.

Here.

Council Member Strauss.

Present.

Council Member Gonzalez.

Here.

Council Member Herbold.

Here.

Council Member Juarez.

Here.

Chair Mosqueda.

Thank you very much.

I hope folks had a chance to get a little bit of lunch.

We are going to continue with our items on the agenda.

We are in section D3 on our calendar here for the discussion today.

This is including items in voting group B.

We're going to continue where we left off, and that was on item 140. Thanks again to our team from central staff, and I will turn it back over to you to walk through the item very briefly.

And then if council members who are sponsoring the item that is currently listed in the consent amendment package would like to add any additional context, you're welcome to do so.

When we get through the list here, you'll still have a chance to identify any items that council members would wish to remove for individual consideration.

Thanks for bearing with us as we get through this rest of the list here.

All right, turning it back over, hello, Jeff.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Our next item on the agenda, item number 140, it's HOM 18A2.

The title is Adding $100,000 from the General Funds to HSD to Support the Social Service Provider Academy.

This is sponsored by Council Member Herbold.

Council Member Herbold, additional comments.

Sure, thank you.

This proves the old adage, if you try, try, try again, eventually you get there.

I really appreciate Chair Mosqueda for putting this in the package.

I made an effort to champion this last year and really appreciate the success of that effort with your support this year.

Students will complete 25 college credits and in doing so they can earn housing and homelessness service provider one and two certificates.

The program began this year in September, currently has 21 students enrolled.

Students were recruited and referred from Plymouth Housing, Catholic Community Services, Chief Seattle Club, Mary's Place, REACH, and DESC.

Racial identity of this cohort were 13 black African-American folks, one Native American, and seven white people.

The majority of the students have lived experiences of homelessness and housing stability.

And again, credits from the program are transferable to Seattle Community College's two and four-year degrees.

So we are helping folks who are out doing the work with lived experiences in advancing their careers and advancing their leadership in this area.

So thanks again.

Thank you very much.

I will also just add, and we continue to hear stories of folks who are providing services on the front line, both as human service providers and within our health system.

And we know that there is quite a few people who are leaving due to the stress and the very low pay of the situation that we've been trying to address over the last services.

We have been doing that for a few years.

We took some of that on last year and the year before with our efforts to make sure there was a cost of living increase that folks who are contracted with the city had not received in over 10 years.

I want to lift that up as we think about the importance of not only investing in services but $800,000 from the general fund to HSD to support the

would find creative ways to work directly with groups that are the cooperatives of actual residents of these tiny home villages.

This is proposed by Councilmember Sawant.

Thank you very much.

And I know Councilmember Sawant and Councilmember Morales had items on this, and we are happy to see it included.

Councilmember Sawant, would you like to provide additional context?

Just very quickly to say that we have seen different models working really effectively and there's no one size fits all.

So we have the model where it's not self-managed, and we also have the model where it's self-managed, and we believe that it's appropriate to allocate some funds for self-managed encampments as well.

We've seen successful examples run by organizations like Nicholsville, and we have heard overwhelming, powerful testimonials from residents of these villages about how that actually community building.

And it promotes a real sense of sort of feeling that this is our place and we are responsible for it, which I think contributes a lot to also the mental well-being of people who have been through a very hard time.

The experience of being unsheltered is so devastating.

So I think that this is appropriate and I appreciate Councilmember Mosqueda adding this into the grouping.

Thank you very much.

Additional comments or context?

Seeing none, thank you very much.

Council Member Swatt, let's keep going.

Next item, number 142 on the agenda is, sorry, yes, 142, is HOM 22A1.

This would add $80,000 from the general fund at just one time to HSD for a vehicle resident outreach and parking offense mitigation project, similar to what the Scoff Law Mitigation Team does as of the city of Santa Rosa.

It is currently funded in the 2020 budget.

Offense mitigation and flexible financial assistance for vehicle residents came to us from the folks who are currently providing critical services through the SCOFLA program.

We know that there's been a 30% increase in the number of people living in their cars due to the economic crisis, and we want to make sure that we are providing folks who are living unhoused an opportunity to have access to critical services.

The SCOFLA medication program currently relies on volunteers and donations to assist with individuals who are living in their vehicles to help them We want to make sure that people have the services that they need to avoid tickets and be in safe places to park.

And we really appreciate the partnership that the mitigation program has with entities like University Heights, who I understand is interested in working with them to make sure that there is a pass-through of funding to be their fiscal sponsor.

We want to reward all of the important work that they are doing, which really does help prevent more people I'm very happy to see this small part included that would include assistance for outreach staff, case management, and financial assistance to restore the ongoing services in next year's budget.

Thank you very much.

Seeing no additional comments.

councilmember Sawant.

Thanks to Asha for the description.

I think the need for this is painfully self-evident, unfortunately, because we know the current police accountability structure is simply not working.

One case in point is how none of the officers involved in killing the eight people members, just since Mayor Durkin came into office, have not faced any discipline.

I understand that such a meaningful overhaul would require several legal steps to come into effect.

It may even need a charter amendment.

This statement of legislative intent requests the city attorney to work with central staff to prepare that full legal pathway to implement genuine community oversight of the police and I really hope that's understood.

Thank you very much Council Member Swan.

Just want to know, it's a little hard to hear you, but I think we got all of that for next time.

And I want to appreciate your office and the central staff's office for working to finesse this to help ensure that this was a combination of work that central staff will be doing to look at various options.

So thank you very much.

Okay, let's move on.

Okay, thank you, Madam Chair.

Item 44 is CBA Ledge 003-A-001.

This is sponsored by Council President Gonzalez.

It would add $200,000 to the Legislative Department's budget to correct pay disparities among employees performing the same or similar duties who have discrepancies in pay.

It would hire a consultant to support a search process for a permanent central staff director, and it would fill a vacant but unfunded central staff analyst position to relieve significant capacity constraints, particularly in the subject areas of community safety, police accountability, and labor standards and regulations.

Excellent.

Very important, council members.

Council President Gonzalez, please go ahead.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'll just be really brief.

Thank you, Lisa, for that description.

It's pretty inclusive.

This is just an opportunity for us to have a small additional amount of dollars to accomplish the things described by Lisa.

in order to ensure that we continue to have efficient operations in the legislative department and continue to be able to provide the basic services expected of the legislative branch.

So this is a modest increase to our operations to allow for us to do that.

We did have a pretty significant I think it is important to note that there was a budget reduction before this.

This is a minor correction to allow for the division directors through the Council President's office to do the three things that were described by Lisa in her

I think this is a reflection of the values that we are putting forward to make sure that issues like this are taken care of.

Thank you.

Yolanda Ho, Council Central staff.

Item number 145 is OED 5A1 sponsored by Councilmember Strauss.

This would add $58,000 of general fund to OED, office of economic development for the special events program lead position.

I would just note that the 2021 proposed budget would have shifted $58,000 of general fund of the salary savings from the proposed elimination of the nightlife business advocate position to this position, which was intended to be supported by admissions tax revenues.

But due to the steep decline in tax revenues, a portion of the position's costs are needed to be supported by general fund.

for the nightlife business advocate position.

The CBA CW1A4 will restore the nightlife business advocate position which was described by Karina previously but it did not provide the additional $58,000 of general fund for the special events position which resulted in the position being partially defunded.

This position is intended to

Thank you chair.

Thank you you want to as you want to mention this funding will restore the special events program lead position in the Office of economic and development earlier in the budget proposed a position and we need to serve as a coordinator for farmers markets in in in so that they could produce the product of the statement of legislative intent on how to streamline bureaucratic barriers for farmers markets.

to receive the permitting and city support that they need as they are independent organizations that provide fresh food from farmers to markets here in the city.

While I still believe that we should explore adding that position, it became clear to me that even more important is to maintain the existing resources and this position in particular.

In addition to the position's usual work, it will be tasked with completing the work in the statement of legislative intent that I just mentioned.

And from a conversation with Office of Economic Development, It does seem, along with Council Member Morales' proposal for the Creative Industry Policy Advisor, by funding those two positions, Office of Economic Development has given me their, they have committed to being able to produce the statement of legislative intent in which I just discussed.

And so this amendment also includes language to prioritize the farmer's market work in the future.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Yolanda.

to be able to make sure that that good work on farmers markets was going to be able to happen.

I appreciate that you got clarification and confirmation from OED that that will go forward with these two pieces that are in our consent agenda amendment package.

Next item.

the Office of Economic Development for Workforce Development Activities.

This would fund an organization that connects low-income job seekers in Seattle and King County with opportunities in the building and construction trades and at the Port of Seattle, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, such as Port Jobs.

This funding would be eliminated in the 2021 proposed budget.

Excellent.

Council Member Strauss?

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Yolanda.

As Yolanda said, this $50,000 would restore the City of Seattle's contribution to programs like the PortJobs program.

PortJobs is one of the only workforce development programs currently providing in-person services due to the airport's status as an essential service.

Airport jobs are beginning to come back slowly, and creating new opportunities for PortJobs to connect with clients is an important opportunity we should invest in.

At least 20 percent of Port Jobs customers are overwhelmingly BIPOC refugee and immigrant community members.

Sorry staff members.

And Seattle's funding is only one portion of this program's funding.

And that's and so this is our portion of funding a larger program for our regional solutions.

Thank you Chair.

Thank you Yolanda.

Thank you so much.

Let's go to the next one.

Item 147 would be OED 900B1 sponsored by Councilmember Morales.

I would just note the document attached to the agenda has the incorrect sponsor, but we will correct that in the future.

This would cut $14,000 one time general fund from the Office of Economic Development for the Creative Industry Policy Advisor position.

This would effectively delay hire of the creative industry policy advisor until about February of next year.

This position was added to the 2020 adopted budget to advance OED's creative industry sector strategy with marketing, stakeholder management, and policy research and development.

Just for reference, OED 900A1, which had been included in the chair's the general fund for this position.

The general fund for this position would have cut all $164,000 of general fund for this position.

Delaying hire until 2022.

a slightly lower salary.

Wanted to make sure that we maintain this, though, is why you see the $14 million reduction.

Just want to underscore before I turn it over to Council Member Morales, this does still, though, retain $150,000, and that's the big takeaway here.

So, Council Member Morales, I know you were a big champion of this.

I'll turn it over to you to explain that position.

Thank you.

Chair and Yolanda, I really appreciate your work in helping us get here.

It is important that we fund this position.

The intention here is for this position to position to coordinate OED's interdepartmental work for the economic recovery and to create programming and support policy development, particularly as it relates to creative industries.

And this is important, especially for recovery, because this was a growing sector before COVID.

We had a lot of major events, musical performances, other performance venues that were shut down and continue to be shut down.

Because this is a growing industry and one that provides good middle-wage jobs and that lots of people of color are moving into, we thought it was really important to continue to prioritize this so that as we move into recovery, we aren't sort of caught flat-footed with the potential growth of this industry.

So really appreciate all of your work to keep this position funded, and I look forward to having my colleagues' support.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Wonderful.

Let's move on to the next item.

Thank you.

Item 148 is OH5A1.

This would add $150,000 for pre-development costs for a proposed housing development project in the central area.

This is in addition to the $100,000 that was included in OH4A2 for the same purpose that was adopted in group A.

So this would make a total of $250,000 available for pre-development costs.

for this project in the central area and this is sponsored by councilmember Sawant.

Councilmember Sawant, please go ahead.

This is very important in our view, even though it is $250,000 for pre-development and not the entire construction project itself.

We do think that this is an important step forward for what is going to be a full square block of affordable housing in a very prime city center location, which is on Yesler Street, Yesler Avenue, where we used to have It was an Asian-American retirement community, which was then dismantled, was bought by a corporate developer, despite the protests that were carried out by community members.

But we can see that the protests were effective because we are here now where the council is considering approving this, which I would really appreciate council members' support on this.

And I also wanted to thank everybody at the Africatown Community Land Trust, and everybody who has been advocating on the people's budget and the solidarity budget.

Thank you very much Council Member Sawant.

And as Council Member Sawant noted, this is additive to the other hundred million, that'd be nice, hundred thousand that is made available for those pre-development costs.

So the total for pre-development costs is two hundred and $50,000.

Again, recognizing what we talked about previous, that there's around, I believe, $13.8 million at the Office of Housing that they have indicated is available for the use of the Africatown land trust folks as they create this great new space for shelter and much-needed services.

So, really excited to see that.

I know that there's an application involved, but we're really excited about the assurances that we've received that there is the capability to move forward, and that's what the pre-development we have to make sure that we are doing the right thing.

And that is what the costs are reflecting here.

Excellent.

Thank you for bringing this forward.

The demand from the environmental community and the indigenous activist community, the urban native community has been to have at least a million dollars added for next year for the ramp up towards 2022 where the Amazon tax that our movement has already won will be increasing the funds for weatherization projects to allow low-income and working-class homeowners to move from gas or oil heating to electric, as Ali just stated.

This budget amendment that's included here will add $200,000, but just as council members already know, I have an upcoming amendment to add $800,000 per the request of the community.

Thank you, Councilmember Sawant.

And just to provide additional clarification about the $200,000 amount in conversations with folks, including MLK Labor, Sierra Club, SAGE, Climate Solutions, Mosca Talks, and others, what we have heard is that there is a desire to make sure that there is this on ramp.

for the $20 million that will become available from the jump start progressive payroll tax for a large investment in creating more sustainable energy sources.

I'm happy to see this.

At least this component accommodated for and look forward to the discussion on the

Next on the agenda is item 150, OLS 1A1.

It is sponsored by Council Member Morales.

And it would add $50,000 to the Office of Labor Standards to implement recommendations of the Domestic Workers Standards Board that was created by the Domestic Workers Ordinance that went into effect about a year and a half ago.

The additional funding would support one or more of the following board recommendations.

develop and expanding services to domestic workers to help them access their rights established by the ordinance to collect and analyze data to understand how the community is responding to the ordinance requirements.

Developing additional or new enforcement methods, especially to address the reasons that may account for or discourage workers from accessing their rights or reporting violations, including the power differentials that can exist between workers and hiring entities, and also to develop an online portable benefits platform for domestic workers.

Just to note that this money is additive to any funds that Office of Labor Standards has already designated for domestic workers implementation.

That would include $50,000 that they've earmarked for outreach to hiring entities and the broader worker outreach fund that is called the Community Outreach and Engagement Fund.

And I didn't introduce myself, but this is Karina Full with Central Staff.

And with that, I will turn it over to Council Member Morales

Thank you.

Councilor Morales.

Thank you.

Thanks so much, Karina.

We all know domestic workers have been on the front lines of this pandemic, exposing themselves to considerable risk as they take care of children, tend to the elderly and clean homes.

So as Karina mentioned, the funding for this is to help implement board recommendations to increase education and outreach about the Domestic Worker Ordinance.

So OLS has done a really great job at the outreach and education for employers and for their responsibilities and domestic workers about their rights.

But we have, I think the estimates are over 33,000 domestic workers in Seattle, so really there will be more work to do.

I also do want to address some of the confusion that an earlier caller seemed to have.

The Domestic Worker Ordinance will not be impacted by this.

That is in effect.

OLS has the staff to implement funding for this work.

They have a policy analyst.

That work is happening.

city workers across the city are stretched, particularly in dealing with some of the issues we have around COVID.

But I just want to be clear that the $50,000 here is in addition to the 1.8 million for worker outreach and for the business outreach that OLS already is doing.

This is about supporting the standards board and making sure that that work is done.

for community outreach and for implementation.

And then finally, as Karina mentioned, trying to create a portable benefits package or platform so that they can also access things like paid time off that many of the rest of us get to enjoy.

So that is the proposal here, and I hope to have my colleagues' support.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Sawant, please go ahead.

Just to add quickly to Council Member Morales' comments, I just wanted to really appreciate the advocates for this budget amendment to get these additional dollars and that my staff, it was a pleasure for my staff and I to help them navigate this advocacy and also sending the public letter to all council members that we should be doing this and I'm glad it's here.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

I would like to note that we have received direct financial assistance from the board as well.

Having worked on this piece of policy last year, I think that we are all very supportive of this effort.

I appreciate that Councilmember Morales and Karina have lifted up that this is additive to money already at to make sure that these priorities continue to get filtered out to the community so that both workers and those employer entities know rights and responsibilities.

Thanks for bringing this forward.

Any additional comments?

Seeing none, let's move forward.

Keetle Freeman, Council Central staff, moving on here to item number 151. This is OPCD 4A1.

This is a report sponsored by Council Member Peterson from the Office of Planning and Community Development, the Office of Housing, and the Seattle Department of Construction and Inspections on three things.

Options for addressing the displacement monitoring data collection gap for naturally occurring affordable housing, that gap, is identified in the University of California Berkeley's Urban Displacement Project Report, which informs the current Displacement Monitoring Program.

The status and outcomes for internal reporting on indicators to inform short-term and long-term displacement mitigation strategies, that's also recommended by Berkeley.

And three recommended additional strategies to mitigate physical and economic displacement.

The report would be developed in consultation with the Equitable Development Initiative Advisory Board, of the Council formally created in September.

Thank you.

Councilmember Peterson.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

Thank you, Kito, for that excellent summary.

This is just a statement of legislative intent asking for a report in June of next year.

Getting this information will provide a more comprehensive picture of our city's affordable housing stock so we can do more to prevent economic displacement.

The reporting required will help to implement Resolution 31870 and Executive Order 2019-02, specifically the gap in the data for naturally occurring affordable housing.

As Ketel said, this gap was recognized by the recent Berkeley Displacement Report.

So we're responding to that report by having the Office of Planning and Community Development work with Office of Housing and Seattle Department of Construction and Inspection to fill that gap so we can consider additional anti-displacement strategies.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Pedersen.

Seeing no additional comments, thank you very much.

Let's move to the next one.

All right, next item is item 152, OSC 5C1 sponsored by Councilmember Strauss.

This would fund 2,600, oh, it would add 1.3 million general fund to the Office of Sustainability and Environment for the FreshBucks program.

This amount would fund an additional 2,600 FreshBucks vouchers which may be used to purchase fruits and vegetables at a variety of retailers, including farmers markets.

For reference, OSC 5B1, which was included in the chairs balancing package, would have added $1.8 million for this purpose, which is equal to 3,600 vouchers.

And this amount was comprised of $1.3 million general fund and $500,000 of Sweden beverage tax proceeds.

that would have been transferred from the Department of Neighborhoods Healthy Food Fund.

This option, before you, only moves forward with the general fund portion that was included in that option.

It does not shift any Sweetened Beverage Tax funding.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Strauss.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Yolanda.

As Yolanda mentioned, this will clear 2,600 people out of the wait list of 3,664 to join the Fresh Bucks program and provide access to fresh food.

The previous proposal of $1.8 million relied on that $500,000 from the Sweetened Beverage Tax Revenue.

And hearing from SBD Advisory Board, we are reducing this amount to the $1.3 million so that SBD can use that $500,000 to get the Healthy Food Fund ramped up faster.

more at the that $500,000 is still being used to increase access to fresh food during this time.

And this funding will complement the other amendments I brought forward to improve supports for farmers markets.

And so we have many different ways that people can have access to fresh food that they need.

I really can't thank you enough chair for I appreciate everyone's work on this.

I appreciate everyone putting this forward in the package.

Yes, thank you for the clarification on how we are going to be using the dollars.

Initially, as you saw from the summary of potential options, there was about $500,000 that was not going to be used until later in the year.

And in an effort to try to get as much fresh food available out to the community as possible, we thought could we front load that to Freshbox.

But it's great to hear that the sugary sweetened beverage We are doing a lot of work to make sure that the county tax community advisory board has plans now to actually front load those dollars.

Use it all in 2021 and start getting food out through culturally competent food partners to a more diverse community.

We are honoring that work as councilmember Strauss said.

with slightly more emphasis on culturally competent food through the healthy food fund.

And that's a separate line item there.

So great partnership.

Thank you very much, Council Member Strauss.

Additional items?

Let's keep going.

Moving on here to agenda item number 153. This is STCI 12B1 sponsored by Council Member Sawant.

This would add $145,000 to STCI for eviction legal defense.

I would like to make a motion to approve package A.

Thank you.

And I appreciate Ketil describing that and also that it's additive to $605,000.

And I was going to say that every dollar that the council approves is going to put to extremely urgent and socially beneficial use.

We know that the state has a moratorium on evictions right now, but as The South Seattle Emerald reported on the 10th of this month in an article written by Erica Barnett mean we have seen that evictions are still happening data from the housing justice project of the King County Bar Association shows that this is an example for King County.

In the month of October nearly 40 people were evicted to the court system in King County, which was, which is up from just eight in April so it's clear that the corporate landlord lobby large landlord slumlords are now starting to assume that they can start targeting and exploiting renters yet again.

And on top of that, you know, obviously that shows that we need as much funding as possible for eviction defense to be provided.

We know from overwhelming testimonials that having a trained attorney to help you makes all the difference in whether or not an eviction ends up on your record and whether or not an eviction ends up in your record makes a huge difference for the rest of your life as a renter, any renter anybody who's rented for any length of time would know exactly what all of that means.

But in addition to all of that, we're now seeing, and this is an article from Crosscut, which is really important, which talks about how the corporate landlord lobby is now starting to pressure the state government and the governor to really water down the moratorium, because the moratorium has to be We don't think the pandemic is going to end anytime soon.

We've just seen a new spike here.

And so now we are seeing a push from landlord lobby to say that there's going to be all kinds of conditions to prove why you can't pay rent.

And we see from all kinds of data going back decades that actually there is very little substance to this mythology that ordinary people, poor people, cash strapped, and working class people end up abusing the services or benefits.

Actually, there's very little data to show that.

But in addition to all of the data that we have from decades together, we also have testimonials from tenant rights advocates who are very clear from all the anecdotal evidence they've seen that willful nonpayment is not a widespread problem.

And they are convinced, and as am I, And as the people's budget is, that requiring proof of hardship cannot be administered easily by whether it's a municipal or state government.

And also it would create massive problems and a lot of people would fall through the cracks.

So we're heading into a very difficult situation, even more difficult than this year is going to be next year.

And so all the resources we have, public resources for eviction defense will come in good stead.

Thank you very much, Councilmember.

I'm seeing no additional hands, and thank you for the comments about the additional money that's in the budget.

We have doubled the program in the first budget, and now we are adding an additional position here as well.

It's going from, I think, two to five positions around that, so very excited to make sure that we support this effort as we look at the wave of potential evictions on the horizon if we don't mitigate it some other way.

Let's keep going.

All right, good afternoon, Madam Chair, members of the committee, Greg Doss, central staff here to talk about item 154, which is SPD 015. SBD 015C001 and this particular item will transfer $450,000 general fund from the Seattle Police Department to the Human Services Department to fund an existing contract for five mental health professionals who are currently paired up with SPD officers as part of the crisis response team.

The action would only transfer the contract and would also, in a separate action, would add $1 million in funding to HSD to support other different kinds of contracted mental health outreach workers and impose two provisos.

So this is an action that the committee has seen before the movement of the mental health providers that are on SPD's crisis response team, actually not the providers themselves, but just the contract to HSD.

The change in this item is that the $1 million before had been going to the CRT.

And in this particular version, $1 million is added to HSD to support the creation or expansion of neighborhood-based teams of mental health, medical, and substance abuse disorder professionals.

These professionals would respond to individuals experiencing chronic and acute behavioral health issues, particularly people experiencing unsheltered homelessness.

And they would be offered the services through a program that is similar to the DESC's Homeless Outreach Stabilization and Transition Team, HOST.

There are two provisos that go along with this action.

One is that 500,000 may not be spent of the Seattle Police Department's budget until SPD provides a report that contains an analysis and recommendations on a process that would allow mental health providers to respond without officers to 911 calls that identify persons in crisis or suffering from mental health related issues.

And then the other proviso is one that restricts the $450,000 that would be spent for the mental health provider contract for SPD so that it may only be used for the crisis response unit.

And it is sponsored by Council Member Strauss.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Strauss, please go ahead.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Greg.

As Greg mentioned, this amendment does not change the current staffing level of the crisis response team in Seattle Police Department.

And when I discussed this with all of you colleagues earlier in the budget process, we looked at expanding the crisis response team.

What we heard from many, many different types of people is that investing these mental health professional dollars upstream will be more important than being responsive to 911. So this amendment keeps the crisis response team whole.

It also adds a million dollars to support mental health outreach response programs, such as the host team that Greg discussed.

The host team's expansion would allow for mental health outreach workers to be distributed geographically throughout the city to respond in real time to crisis situations.

that do not require law enforcement, as well as they will be able to respond without 911 to people in our communities.

And investing mental health resources upstream will decrease the number of behavioral health 911 calls placed.

These outreach workers or first responders, however you want to categorize them, as I said, will be geographically distributed to ensure that all districts in the city have these important mental health professionals in their neighborhood.

scaling up mental health-oriented approaches to responding to individuals in crisis on our streets is an important part of ensuring public safety for all of our community members.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Greg.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Additional questions?

OK.

I know we've heard from a handful of folks who work in the service provider world.

They appreciate this.

So thank you for bringing that forward.

Next item.

All right, the next item is number 155, which is SPD 116B001, and it's sponsored by Council Member Strauss.

This council budget action would impose a proviso that restricts SPD from spending $550,000 until it provides a report that meets the requirements of resolution 31962 regarding the Harbor Patrol and functions that might be transferred to the Seattle Fire Department.

So by way of background, resolution 31962 was passed by the council last summer.

And in it, there was a request for a report on what kind of non-law enforcement functions might be transferred from SPD to SFD.

And this particular action is one that the council has seen before.

The only difference with this option is that there are some specific requests around this report that are new.

that is consistent with the original request.

With that, as I said, it is sponsored by Councilmember Strauss.

Councilmember Strauss, please go ahead.

With so many different things going on, I had requested, and maybe I didn't communicate clearly enough, that I would like this proviso to also look at if these functions could be transferred into the fire department or into the community safety and communications department.

I know that my team has worked with Allie to understand that that change could happen in January when we officially adopt these slides.

I would like to make sure that this correction is made during this budget process to reduce confusion

I would like to see that in writing.

Thank you for flagging that.

I'm guessing we will pull this item and if you have a verbal amendment that is easy to understand we would like to see that in writing as well.

If your team has something in writing to make sure to share that with Ally and crew that way we can have something we can visually show folks.

that is process-wise correct.

And I just want to clarify, because I did say you could wait until the council adopts the slides at the beginning of the year, because I thought it was a slide.

So that was my bad advice, because it is actually a proviso.

But process-wise, it would be correct.

When we get to the end of group B, you'll want to pull it, and then you can make a verbal amendment.

And I'll work with your team to get something ready here.

Great.

And Council Member Herbold, you are off of mute, just in case.

Thank you.

No problem.

I'll just finish up my comments here if that's all right, Chair, so that I don't have to write.

So while the resolution deadline for that report was in October, SPD indicated that it would not be able to respond in that time.

So instead, we include this conversation as part of that interdepartmental team process.

So this provisor restricts $550,000 of Harbor Patrol's 2021 budget, which is about one month of operating dollars pending the receipt of this report by May 24th, 2021. So it ensures that there's flexibility.

This should ensure that we don't delay in getting the information, which is valuable in informing future policy choices about Harbor Patrol.

I was glad to work with Council Member Herbold on this as she helped include several specific questions to the proviso after form Bs were submitted.

which is why it's listed in this section.

Again, just for the general population who are watching right now, Harbor Patrol is an important function in our water-based city.

And there are a number of different functions within Harbor Patrol that are memorialized through memorandums of understanding rather than through code.

And it's important for us to understand which functions of the Department of that Harbor Patrol are strictly law enforcement and which are So thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Greg.

Thank you, Council Member Herbold.

Thank you very much, Council Member Strauss.

Let's move on to the next item.

All right, the next item is number 156, which is SPD-021A-001 that is sponsored by you, Madam Chair.

It is a statement of legislative intent that would require that SPD submit to the council a report that provides recommendations on demilitarizing the police force.

The report should focus on enacting new policies that would include the limitation of purchasing of assault rifles, high caliber munitions, armored vehicles, and armored vehicles that would be used by tactical units, assessing the use style and display of tactical body armor during demonstrations, training programs that would focus officer mindset on citizen service and protection, assessing additional uniform options for minimizing the visibility of weapons and equipment while recognizing employee well-being and safety, and prioritizing citizen safety and well-being over protection of property.

Thank you very much, Greg.

Colleagues, this is something that we've talked about for a number of years.

We've heard anecdotally stories of individual officers who have been showing up at recent protests, especially showing up to protests in support of black lives, who they themselves have said, you know, why am I showing up in otherwise military outfits with a response that would indicate that they're ready to go to battle instead of showing up in you know, their bike uniform or something like that, that is a little less intimidating.

Also, we have heard directly from the inspector general and the office of police accountability that often the situations have been escalated by the presence of police and the type of equipment that they have, I think can also escalate the situation when really what we wanna do is deescalate.

I've also had a conversation directly with the chief about this, and I think that there is potentially some shared interest in evaluating the type of equipment that is currently being purchased.

I would very much like to limit the supply line items from being able to be used for items like this.

We are currently undergoing a review process of how we use and purchase our crowd control weapons.

And I think until that happens, this is a interim step to make sure that we are looking across the board about how we can create a more approachable force that is not militarized, that is not spending millions of dollars on things like tanks and other equipment.

So I appreciate that there's some shared interest there.

I think it would be helpful for us to think about the ways in which this type of report could be helpful in future efforts as well.

Councilmember Herbold?

I appreciate knowing that.

Thank you very much.

Let's move to the next item.

Item is 157 and it's SPL 1B1.

It's now sponsored by Council Member Lewis.

And it is a slide that requests that the library open curbside pickup and return at all branches or do in-branch service at 25% capacity.

Very excited about this, Council Member Lewis.

Thank you so much.

Asha for queuing that up.

We've talked about this a couple of times already during the deliberations over the budget.

Since the last time we discussed it we've incorporated feedback from the library as well as feedback from the unions who represent employees in the library to make sure that we are being cognizant of how to do this in a way that is safe and recognizing the limitations of COVID and the governor's orders.

now more than ever as we are facing another wave of those orders.

I do think it is important in times of really strong adversity like this where folks are needing to sequester at home to have at their at their access the full resources of the Seattle library system particularly for people who have difficulty accessing purely digital or purely remote collections.

I think that there's a way to go even further and beyond what we have done, which is commendable in terms of allowing some branches to have curbside pickup.

But I think as we confront this, we should follow the lead of some other regional library systems, including King County, which has had a very robust process at allowing more access to their physical collections and allowing it in more branches.

So that is essentially what this is requesting, and I look forward to it being incorporated in the budget.

Thank you very much.

Appreciate you bringing this forward.

OK, let's keep going.

I'm Dan Eater, Interim Director of Council Central Staff.

Item 158 is SPR 600A1.

It is sponsored by Council Member Lewis.

This budget action would add approximately $2.4 million of one-time general fund to the 2021 budget for the purpose of implementing a Clean Cities Initiative.

This action would add funding to the budgets of Seattle Parks and Recreation, the Seattle Department of Transportation, Seattle Public Utilities, and the Office of Economic Development for a four-month surge in a variety of cleanup and related activities.

A separate budget action, BLG 2B3, is item number 160, later in this group of budget actions on your agenda.

That separate budget action would also amend the third quarter supplemental to add $720,000 for the same purpose in 2020. The cumulative funding in the two related council budget actions totals $3.1 million across the two years, 2020 and 2021. I will turn it back over to you.

Thank you so much.

of the specific breakdown of department and service.

As I go out and do a lot of these walkthroughs of unsanctioned encampments, and I know this has been echoed by other members of the council here as well, Council Member Morales in particular, one thing I hear a lot from folks who are living unhoused in unsanctioned encampments is the desire for a more regular and efficient removal of garbage and trash from a lot of these encampment sites.

And I know that that's an area of mutual interest with businesses that are near unsanctioned encampments as well as residents of nearby buildings who are living housed.

So this goes a long way towards demonstrating how we can respond and effectively remove the garbage and waste that's associated with really how any human being lives, but what we take for granted by having the dependable service that we get by being housed and by having a regular garbage pickup.

So this incorporates some things that have been discussed extensively and that other council members have led on throughout the budget process, particularly council member Morales and the expansion of the purple bag program, which is incorporated into this.

So I think it really does represent a good effort to come together on this issue to mitigate the impacts that we're seeing from a lot of unsanctioned encampments and really provide the service that a lot of us take for granted and that we should be extending to everybody in the city.

Thank you so much.

Are there any additional comments on this item?

Yes, Madam Chair.

Yes, please go ahead Council Member Juarez.

Thank you.

As you know, last week I had raised concerns about or actually question or actually wanted to pursue the Clean Cities Initiative.

I know that the executive was originally asking, I think, for 5.6.

I think this is a good place to land and a good beginning because again I want to stress that increasing the trash pickup to proactively increase cleaning in parks and open spaces to help business districts manage issues of trash accumulation while working to preserve livelihoods is really important.

I think I shared this sentiment last week as well that I believe that two sides of the equation are on one side is Reaching out for people on the ground, providing services and directing people and navigating them to shelter and services.

And the other side of the equation is picking up the piles and piles of trash and all the other issues that we see in our parks and our green spaces.

And also I had an opportunity which I'm sure you all did as well to look at the clean city route analysis and the neighborhoods that they're first going to be looking at this in South Seattle, Georgetown, Little Saigon, Capitol Hill, Ballard, University District.

Aurora and Lake City.

And so I think this is a really good start looking at the heat map where we need it most.

And I just really want to commend Superintendent Agare of Parks because we've worked very closely with him and particularly their staff in light of COVID.

I believe that they have not had to lay off one person, maybe one person.

And in fact, their staff has been so flexible and so good to be first in the front lines of taking their regular job and being deployed to do other jobs, mainly laser focused on cleaning up the trash and beyond hand washing stations, beyond purple bags.

I'm talking, you know, couches, TVs, grills, mattresses, tents.

needles.

So I just I'm really thankful.

And I want to thank Council Member Lewis for bringing this forward.

I think this is really needed.

And I'm hoping that we can move forward on this.

And this is a starting point that we move hand in hand with what we passed earlier, and giving our what I'm calling our North End navigators and South End navigators on the ground to work hand in hand with parks, hopefully SPU, and cleaning up all of these open spaces, public spaces, green spaces, and parks.

So thank you.

Thank you very much, Council Member Juarez.

Any additional comments?

Council Member Morales, please go ahead.

Thank you.

I am excited that we will be seeing more trash pickup, as everybody knows, in every part of the city.

That is certainly something that our neighborhood business districts could benefit from, our residential areas could benefit from.

So I'm glad to see that happening.

And I just want to state for the record that our office will be paying close attention to how this actually rolls out.

It's our understanding that there are two.

former navigation team members that are already doing some of the works in parks, and these are the folks who were responsible for determining whether something qualified or merited an obstruction sighting so that sweep could happen.

On the one hand, I'm happy that this is moving forward because everybody can see clearly that we need additional trash pickup throughout the city.

And do want to say that we will be very interested to see how this unfolds.

And my hope is that this is a good faith effort on everyone's part to ensure that our homeless neighbors don't get caught up in some of the activity that used to be happening through this work.

Thank you very much.

Well said.

And good reminder that this is additive.

This is a surge capacity, especially in the winter months as we see more folks who are facing homelessness and housing instability.

This would be additive to that purple bag program, as you mentioned, and appreciate the mayor's office and working with council members, especially Council Member Lewis is the champion of this.

I understand that the original request was north of 5 million, but that they scaled it down to 3.12.

So we are really meeting them at the $3.1 million figure here and hoping, as the councilmembers have noted, that we continue to see holistic services offered in addition to that garbage cleanup, which we know is so critical.

And lastly, thank you all.

Councilmember Juarez mentioned this early last week.

Councilmember Morales had an additional form C on this.

So I think there's a lot of shared interest in this council and partnering to make sure that we are providing these public health services to our community at large.

Excited to see this and let's move on.

Good afternoon councilmembers, Brian Goodnight, council central staff.

Item 159 is budget action SPU 4C1, which would provide $100,000 of general fund to Seattle Public Utilities to develop and implement a publicly accessible sink program.

This makes minor revisions to an item that was included in the chair's balancing package discussed last week, and it's for the same amount.

The description now references that the SINC program should be based upon the model developed by the Clean Hands Collective.

And it also specifies that up to 5% of the funds may be used for a survey to identify high area needs for SINC placement.

And this item is sponsored by Council Member Morales.

Thank you.

Thanks so much, Brian.

As he said, this is modeled here on a design that was created by Clean Hands Collective.

These things are currently deployed near homeless services up in the north end.

And the idea here is to create a cost effective sinks.

These are ADA compliant.

They hook up to city water and they filter into a rain garden.

So right now we have 15 hand-washing stations across the entire city.

With this additional funding, we'll be able to create a network of street sinks and be able to provide public hand-washing stations throughout the city with a total, I believe, of about 78 sinks citywide.

So really excited to be able to do this and want to thank community.

We have a lot of folks who have been advocating for clean hands collective, real change, and all the folks who have been advocating for every opportunity to create better hygiene opportunities for our folks throughout the city.

Last item, Lisa K. Okay, item 160, BLG002-B-003 recommends approval and passage of the third quarter supplemental and it is sponsored by the Budget Committee.

This revised version only makes three additional amendments beyond those that were identified in the chair's balancing package.

It would provide $100,000 for the mayor's community safety work group that's associated with equitable communities initiative and would cut the remaining $400,000 for 2020. However, additional funding would be available in 2021 from the $30 million that's appropriated for the equitable communities initiative.

The second change would be to cut $4.1 million from FAS in one-time savings from the city's contracts with King County for jail services and public defense.

And that would provide greater additional fund balance to support the council's priorities in the 2021 budget.

Finally, the third change would add $720,000 to the four departments mentioned in the previous items to start implementing the proposed Clean Cities Initiative relative to items 157 and 158, as you heard before.

So those four departments are Parks and Recreation, SDOT, Public Utilities, and Office of Economic Development.

Thank you very much.

And folks who might not know this, Lisa Kay has been very busy behind the scenes working on quarter three, which is its own endeavor as we continue to work on calendar year 2021. So thank you very much, Lisa, for all of that work.

Okay, colleagues, we do have one item that was listed on your agenda.

My understanding is that the sponsor is interested in pulling item number 161. Council Member Strauss, would you like to comment on that?

Or happy to have central staff comment on it as well if you'd like.

Yeah, here I thought my camera had been on this entire time.

I must have turned it off for another reason.

So happy to pull this back.

It's my understanding that OIR has found some cost savings from other aspects of their portfolio to be able to fully fund our AWC dues.

Without paying dues in full, we don't have a seat at the table for either the Association of Washington Cities or the National League of Cities.

So this is important.

$57,000.

And I'm grateful that OIR has been able to find this capacity elsewhere.

So pulling this amendment back and thank you, Chair.

Thank you very much Councilmember Strauss and confirming what you have already said.

The additional capacity that they have found will not impact programs or services.

Will not impact our efforts to be represented in Olympia and nationally.

And I understand that is coming from a vacant position that they're able to carry forward under spend dollars.

So thank you for all your work on that.

And we will remove item 161 from our agenda.

We are able to pull in any individual item that you think requires additional discussion or debate to be voted on individually.

Once we have pulled those items, we will then go back and consider the Group B as a whole package.

As a reminder, you do not have to pull an item.

If you want to speak to it more than you already have, you are welcome to do that before we consider a final vote on Group B. So we're going to go ahead and allow council members to identify any item that they would like to request be pulled out for a separate vote on the consent item package.

And I'm going to give you an example.

Item 136 is an item that we put forward.

It was an inadvertent effort on our part, error on our part.

I want to make sure that the language that we've been talking with stakeholders about is reflected in the final document here.

So I'm in an effort to make sure that we are including the document that we've talked with about to stakeholders about the process for the task force being aligned and not duplicative of other efforts such as participatory budgeting and making sure that we're consistent with our conversations with those stakeholders.

I want to make sure that we get that right document uploaded there, but it will not change the dollars amount.

Lisa spoke to that as well as I did earlier, making sure that both in quarter three's budget and in next year's budget, there is also dollars available up to 500,000 to be able to be used for the early contracting to help facilitate the discussion.

So I will be pulling 136 to move forward to substitute with that minor technical change.

Any additional items folks would like to pull?

Council President, please go ahead.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I move that item 127BLG042A001 be removed for an individual vote.

You are muted, Chair.

Thank you very much.

Council President is moving item 127BLG042A001.

for individual vote.

Is there another item that anybody would like to remove?

Councilmember Herbold.

Thank you.

I would like to move that Agenda Item 143, Statement of Legislative Intent, Law-2-A-1 be removed for individual vote.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Herbold is moving item number 143, Law-002A-001 be pulled for individual vote.

Additional comments, I'm sorry, additional hands.

I see Council Member Strauss, please go ahead.

Thank you, Chair.

Yes, I would like to move item 155 SPD-016B-001, the proviso on Harbor Patrol for individual votes so that I may make a voice amendment.

Thank you.

That sounds great.

Thank you, Council Member Strauss.

I will make a motion to approve the amendment.

And also with your verbal amendment if you have something you are going to read if you can share it with myself and Ali that would be helpful as well.

Thank you very much.

Additional items?

I would like to move to have an individual vote on item 141, which is CBA HOM 021-A-001.

Make sure I got that correct.

Item number 141, which is HOM 021-A-001.

Thank you very much, Councilmember.

I feel like I'm in an auction.

Anything else?

Okay, I am not seeing any additional hands at this point.

So I'm gonna summarize the items that I see and concur with our team from central staff and Patty that we have this correct.

Number 127, number 136, 143, 155, and 141. I'm gonna read those either Council budget action items our CBA numbers or our statement of legislative intent numbers just for the record here so that people have both the item number and the correct association in our draft budget here.

So items 127 is BLG 042A001 item 136 FG003B001 item 141 HOM021A001 Item 143, LAW-002A-001.

And lastly, item 155 on our agenda is SPD-016B-001.

Are there any additional council members that would like to remove any item on today's group B consent amendment package?

All right, folks, this seems doable.

Let's begin.

Allie, I think that what would be helpful is if you could, in I think alphanumeric order here, we're going to read again the summary of the title here.

We don't have to go too much in depth.

I'll turn it over to the person who has pulled the item.

You may have to remind me as we go through this, but I think I got it.

And then we will go to the sponsor of the item.

And then we will take a vote to consider its inclusion in our consent amendment Wonderful.

Thank you very much, Ali.

So the first item that was removed from, let's see here, the items were removed from the package.

I just want to clarify with the chair, before we move to the individual items, I think you want to move the rest, the package as amended and vote on that package.

That sounds great.

I'm seeing thumbs up from our colleagues.

Let me do that.

So before we get to item D3A on the agenda, I'm going to go ahead and move D3.

Are there any additional requests to move any other items?

Seeing none, is there any additional comments on the consent package?

Seeing no additional comments, will the clerk please call the roll?

of the Adoption of Consent Amendment Package in Group B. Lewis.

Aye.

Morales.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

Yes.

Juarez.

Aye.

Strauss.

Yes.

Yes.

Gonzalez?

Aye.

Chair Mosqueda?

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

With the removal of the items that were listed by central staff, the motion does carry and the amended consent package is approved.

Thank you very much.

Now let's go ahead and move into items D3A, which are items removed from the consent package.

We're going to consider these items again in alphanumeric order.

We're going to be reminded if there is a substitute, Allie and the central staff team along with the clerk's office will help us remember if there is certain scripts that we need to stick to.

If you do have a substitute item after the motion to substitute is second, I will recognize the central staff to walk us through both the substitute item and the agenda being substituted.

And then I'll recognize the sponsor to address it.

I am going to also recognize the individual who has pulled it in case they have any additional comments to add before we turn it over to the sponsors.

Okay, wonderful.

So central staff, thank you very much.

Allie, let's go to the first item on the removed package from voting group B.

Okay, so the first item removed is item 127 BLG 42A1.

This would pass council bill 119, 951 to implement a $20 increase.

to the STVD vehicle license fee and add $3.6 million to the Department of Transportation for bridge maintenance programs.

Council President Gonzalez made the motion to remove this item that is sponsored by Council Member Peterson.

Thank you very much.

Council President Gonzalez, please go ahead.

Thank you so much, Chair Mosqueda.

I pulled this item, item number 127, in order to place a substitute bill before the City Council for consideration of adoption, again, as a substitute to the originally proposed So I'm happy to move that substitute if that's the appropriate thing to do now, but I think, I think I can't move the substitute until there's been an actual motion to consider the underlying CBA, and then a call for comments and then I can discuss my, my substitute.

I'm happy to sort of punt on those procedural issues and talk about why I'm making the substitute first.

But I think procedurally, Allie is probably going to tell us that I can't even talk about the substitute without having...

Get the procedural stuff out of the way.

Procedural stuff out of the way.

I think, I think...

Oh, sorry.

I think if this is correct, let me know.

I move

So I think what you would like to do here is you'd like to move the item that's on the agenda.

Move approval of BLG 042A001.

And then after that is seconded, Council President Gonzalez can move her substitute.

You can ask central staff to explain the original item and the substitute version, have some discussion before taking a vote on the motion to substitute.

Because again, if you vote yes on the motion to substitute, you are taking out the original item for consideration.

Okay, great.

So to put it in front of us, I move approval of council bill BLG042A001 as included in voting group B consent package.

Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded to approve council bill BLG042A001.

Are there any comments or amendments?

Council President Gonzalez.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

We're going to get through these procedures, I promise.

Thank you, Chair.

I move to substitute BLG042B001 in place of BLG042A001.

Second.

It's been moved and seconded before we take a vote that would move to substitute this.

Is there additional comments?

Council President, would you like to speak to your motion?

I think I'm going to let Allie or whomever else is appropriate from central staff explain the difference between the original and the substitute.

And then I'm happy to make comments about my substitute version.

Thank you, Council President.

I'm going to ask my colleague Calvin Chow to describe the two amendments, and he may provide some context for the proposal generally.

Calvin, if you're available.

Good afternoon Council Members, Calvin Chow with Council Central staff.

The original underlying proposal, BLG 042A-001, increases our existing $20 vehicle license fee to a $40 vehicle license fee, and then it directs those resources for 2021 to bridge maintenance programs.

The proposed substitute, BLG042B001, would enact similar legislation but would not direct where those resources would go at this time.

It would park those appropriations in finance general and request that there be a spending plan being developed by SDOT for presentation to council for a future budget action.

If it is useful, I have a graphic prepared to just try to highlight how this is different from the transit funding dollars.

That may or may not be useful to you, but I did prepare that in case that helps put this into some context.

I think that that would be fine, Calvin.

Patty, could you please put up that graphic, please?

or if not, I can, oh, great, thank you.

So council members, this graphic in front of you shows the different revenue options that are available to transportation benefit districts.

And I wanted to just highlight what we're talking about here is in item H here.

So you can see that there are some revenue options that council can take with transportation benefit districts.

And we have had in place since 2010, a $20 vehicle license fee that's shown in item G.

and that has funded basic transportation maintenance since 2010. State law allows us to increase that to $40 total, as long as that original fee has been in place for 24 months.

So since we've had that for 10 years, we could increase that to $40.

And that is a proposal in front of us with BLG 042. Separately, there is also impact fees that the Transportation Benefit District could consider as a councilmatic option, but all the other revenue options are voter approved, and those are the ones at the very top.

And you'll see that items A and B were the 2014 transit measure.

Item C, which we talked about earlier today, is the new 1.15% sales tax.

that goes in place in 2021. And then there are some additional voter approved revenue options.

But I think it's important for us to understand there are sort of two distinct funding sources with different authorities behind them.

The one for BLG 042 is Councilmanic, does not have to go to the voters and would essentially be doubling the existing $20 VLF to $40.

Thank you very much, Calvin.

Council President, I'm going to turn it back over to you for comments, and then I will turn it to the sponsor of the original sponsor on this item for our continued discussion.

Council President.

Thank you chair and thank you Calvin for that that handy graph really, really appreciate that it gives a lot of clarity to something that is rather clunky, if you will, in terms of how the revenue sources work.

So I appreciate that.

So colleagues at present time, as you just heard Calvin say that the Seattle Transportation Benefit District is funded via a a $20 vehicle license fee that has been imposed legislatively in perpetuity since 2010. In addition to that, there is a voter approved $60 additive fee in addition to a .1% sales tax.

Beginning in January 2021, the city will no longer collect the $60 vehicle licensing fee following the voters' overwhelming approval of Proposition 1, which discontinued the vehicle licensing fee in lieu of an increase of the transit sales tax to 0.15%.

Under RCW 36.73, the city has the authority to immediately and legislatively impose a vehicle licensing fee of up to a total maximum of $40.

I support a $20 increase to the vehicle licensing fee because I believe it is necessary to support the ongoing operations of our city's transit services and the maintenance of our transportation infrastructure and networks.

Because of the expiration of the previous STBD ballot measure, Seattle's vehicle owners will actually see a $60 decrease to their vehicle licensing fee for all car tab renewals after January 1st, 2021. And despite the increased sales tax, the city stands to collect over $10 million less for the STVD annually than under the previous 2014 ballot measure.

If approved, this council budget action will still result in Seattle residents experiencing a $40 decrease to their total annual vehicle licensing fee payments.

If approved, this budget action will still result in STVD having less revenue to expend annually in 2021 to 2026 than it did under the expiring six-year ballot measure.

I appreciate deeply the work and commitment of Councilmembers Peterson, Herbold, and Lewis to bring this proposal forward, and I do not disagree with or oppose their policy objectives.

There is certainly no shortage of need in our Transportation Benefit District to support additional transit hours, bike and pedestrian infrastructure, and bridge maintenance.

I do feel, however, that more work and stakeholder engagement must be done before we can decide how to appropriate this additional revenue.

The substitute budget action proposes that the anticipated $3.6 million in 2021 revenue be held under proviso in finance general until the city, led by SDOT, has engaged in a thorough stakeholder engagement process that can inform a spending plan to prioritize the appropriation of these funds.

The proposal submitted by council members Peterson, Herbold, and Lewis is prescriptive by requiring that the $3.6 million collected in 2021, which is the total amount that can be collected in 2021, be spent only on bridge maintenance.

It additionally would require that in the outward years, the City of Seattle spend the fully collected $7.2 million per year on only bridge maintenance.

In contrast, my substitute budget action is not prescriptive.

In other words, if adopted by the Council, my budget action does not prohibit the use of any of this revenue for bridge maintenance.

Rather, my substitute budget action parks this revenue in finance general and requires that the city of Seattle engage in a meaningful stakeholder process that will guide SDOT's future expenditures within the lawful boundaries of the STBD and existing city and state law.

Some may argue that they're not comfortable imposing a tax without a defined spending plan in place.

I have two responses to that argument or concern.

First, while opponents have used that reasoning to try to defeat tax proposals in the past, this is not a new tax.

The existing $20 vehicle licensing fee is a well-established fee that is guided by state and city statutes that limit and direct how this revenue may be spent.

RCW 36.73, which authorizes transportation benefit districts, sets the parameters for how these revenues can be spent and dictates that they must be dedicated to transportation uses while giving local jurisdictions discretion over how to best prioritize spending.

So I believe that those statutory parameters predefines the contours of our spending plan.

And what is at issue here is how to prioritize the spending of these dollars within those lawful boundaries.

I believe it's critical we give valued stakeholders and community members the opportunity to advise the city on how to prioritize the use of these dollars in the context of our broader investments in the Seattle Transportation Benefit District, transit services, and our transportation infrastructure.

Second, if council members share the concern that it would be imprudent to pass this vehicle licensing fee without a spending plan in place now, The answer is not to jam this fee and spending plan through the last phase of our budget process.

Rather, I believe the prudent and reasonable solution to that concern would be to pull this proposed council bill action altogether and instead establish a stakeholder process, conduct the engagement, receive recommendations, and deliberate the spending plan and the fee at the same time with the benefit of stakeholder and taxpayer input into how these additional dollars can be utilized to support authorized uses including bridge maintenance.

So again, the only difference between my proposal and the proposal made by council members Peterson, Herbold, and Lewis is really related to what the stakeholder engagement process should look like in order to guide our Decision making and the department's decision making around how these dollars should be expended and and it is absolutely possible that that engagement process and that stakeholder process will conclude that a portion of the dollars.

that are collected by the vehicle license fee should be spent on bridge maintenance.

But I do think it's important for us to allow for that process to unfold.

My preference here would be for us to pass the vehicle license fee legislation now and to allow for the stakeholder process to occur.

I did have a conversation with Director Sam Zimbabwe early this morning via email.

He did indicate that He would want to see perhaps a shorter stakeholder engagement process for the department's ability to have greater certainty around operationalizing any sort of spending plan.

And so my hope is that before Monday, if there is an amendment that needs to be made here, we'll be able to work with Council Central staff and the department to identify that small technical change to a timeline related to we are looking forward to hearing from councilmembers about the stakeholder engagement process and the outside date of when council would consider adoption of a spending plan.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

you very much, Council President.

I appreciate you walking us through that explanation of the substitute.

I will turn it over to Councilmember Peterson as the original sponsor of this item.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda, and thank you, Council President.

That was a really fair and well-said response to this issue and to your substitute.

And I want to thank Council Members Herbold and Lewis as well for teaming up on this.

Seattle is defined by its waterways and ravines, so we rely on our aging bridges to connect us and keep our economy moving by safely carrying multiple modes of travel.

When there is no bridge, there are no transportation choices.

I toured the cracked and closed West Seattle Bridge yesterday.

I was inside the bridge.

The maintenance needs are tremendous there, and it really is eye-opening experience when we consider all the other bridges that connect our city.

Maintaining our bridges takes money and experts, not more process or lobbying at City Hall.

We have been discussing for months the need for more bridge maintenance throughout our city ever since the West Seattle High Bridge cracked and closed.

And our city auditor started work on a citywide bridge assessment, which we received several weeks ago, showing that our bridges throughout the city are aging and disrepair, need more maintenance dollars now.

We've been discussing for months the need to overturn I-976 because the vehicle licenses are vital to fund transportation projects and programs as authorized by state law.

And as Council President pointed out, folks are paying $80 now and it will drop to 20. So this underlying legislation would take it to $40.

So we can do all we can for transportation next year.

And as Calvin pointed out, we are able to do this councilmanically on our own.

We all support transit, bridges support transit.

As we await a vaccine for COVID and transit ridership to recover after plummeting sharply this year during the pandemic, The bridge audit that we've received concludes we have an urgent need today to increase maintenance of our bridge infrastructure.

So the budget form C that accompanies the council bill enables us to make a larger down payment toward this infrastructure priority.

and focus it on our frequent transit network.

And this is just for 2021, so it's not prescriptive beyond 2021. Despite the sharp loss of transit ridership, including bus ridership this year due to the pandemic that is spiking again, I know we are optimistic about the future and we wanna make sure our economy recovers and transit ridership along with it.

So this bill is just about $3.6 million for bridge maintenance just for next year.

There are many more dollars available for transit service hours in 2021 due to an over $23 million reserve left over from the expiring STBD.

$23 million versus the $3.6 million we're trying to add to bridge maintenance.

That's in addition to the dollars overwhelmingly approved by voters this past November.

So as part of the future meetings of our Transportation and Utilities Committee, working with SDOT, Transit Advisory Board, Move Seattle Levy Oversight Committee, Transportation Equity Work Group, labor unions, other stakeholders who are already planning to have a process for those much larger sums of money.

The amount for bridge maintenance and the balancing packages is welcome, but falls short.

Approving the dollars for bridge maintenance now is important to enable SDOT to recruit additional inspectors and engineers now.

I don't believe we need many more months of Seattle process to determine whether our bridges are breaking or to determine how to spend just $3.6 million when we're literally passing a $6.5 billion budget this Monday.

I would urge my colleagues to support the original form C so for just 2021, we can have this additional increment for bridge maintenance.

So in short, buses need bridges too.

Our measure focuses these dollars on the frequent transit network.

We cannot ignore the bridge audit and transit funding will increase as transit demand increases.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Council Member Juarez, you are next in the queue.

Thank you.

First of all, I want to thank our friends at TCC, the Transportation Choices Coalition, and the eight other signatories and the letter that they had sent to council dated November 17th, which was yesterday.

I want to thank Council Member Peterson in his timely response to the concerns raised by TCC, and the other eight, as I said, signatories.

Council Member Peterson raised eight important points to respond to the community concerns that were raised.

Without going into detail because Council Member Peterson can speak for himself, but from what I've read and what I've looked at, this is 3.6 million for the year 2021. I do have faith in the bridge audit.

And I just wanted to share two other major points, first being that I think it's important to note that the VLF can be used for a variety of transportation projects, including infrastructure, maintenance and capital improvements.

But before I get there, I want to say something in general, because TCC has been such a good partner in other areas.

I'm a member of the Puget Sound Regional Council Transportation Committee.

and also a member of Sound Transit.

And I want to share my meeting with Mr. Terry White, the new GM at Metro.

Starting with Puget Sound Regional Council, they are working on their regional equity strategy.

A lot of stakeholder involvement and meetings about and TCC was able to provide comments there as well.

Their progress report on their work to support BIPOC and other marginalized communities, looking at opportunity maps, exclusionary zoning, red lighting, mortgage lending, all of these practices these institutionalized racist practices that prevented and excluded targeted BIPOC communities from transportation, wealth, equity, and access.

In our discussions with Mr. White, the new GM at Metro, they are also doing an equity analysis.

So the PSRC is doing an equity strategy.

Metro is doing their equity analysis, again, with stakeholder groups, with their mobility framework, with a cabinet, an equity cabinet of 23 members, many which are part of TCC and all these other groups that have signed on to the letter.

Not only discussing about bus routes and realignment in bus routes and emphasis in South Seattle, but how we look at transportation and shifting resources to the South End.

As a member of Sound Transit, I'll tell you what my main concern is, is that every meeting, whether it's the full board meeting or the subcommittee meetings, perennial topic all the time is the bridges, particularly West Seattle and Ballard.

In light of the fact that we're hoping that we get light rail to West Seattle in 2030, and we get light rail to Ballard in 2035. So I really appreciate what Council President Gonzalez said, but I think the times are a little bit different about having a six-month period for stakeholder when we know the emergent factor now is we have a bridge that's not working.

And my concern is this, and I learned this from Deshaun from Metro.

Thank you, Deshaun.

I told him that I would use this sentence because I think it sums it up for me, that in looking at these equity strategies, these equity plans, this equity analysis, I think we already kind of know we have a bridge that's down and we have other bridges that we need to look at, that we have to be value-driven and data-informed.

So Metro, PSRC, the Transportation Committee, and Sound Transit are all discussing and implementing mobility plans, bus service, making sure that we're looking at those areas that need it the most, and a primary emphasis on equity.

So all of those voices are being heard in these three different areas, regionally and citywide, for bus services, bus routes, and many of the issues that TCC shared in their letter.

So I'm not inclined to support Council President's substitute.

However, I think she offered an excellent solution to if it isn't six months, perhaps three months.

That I'm more inclined to support.

the substitute with a shorter timeline in light of the exigent circumstances of basically one of our main bridges, West Sale Ridge being down, and the other four bridges that the audit looked at.

For me, I can't support the substitute in its current form, but I'm certainly open to supporting the substitute if we went from six to three months.

Because again, we have to emphasize this is 3.6 million for 2021, during COVID, West Seattle Bridge down, that's the reason why we had the audit done, and also looking at the Ballard Bridge as well.

So I'll leave it at that, thank you.

Thank you very much, Council Member Juarez.

Council Member Sawant.

Thank you.

I will be supporting the substitution presented by Council President Gonzalez.

Community organizations like the Transit Riders Union have advocated for the opportunity to weigh in on how this funding will be used and this substitution will give them the time to do so.

I will mention after this vote, I intend to move a second substitution, which my office sent to you all over email last night, to change the revenue source of this funding.

My amendment will not comment on how the fund should be used, but would only change the funding source, increasing progressive business taxes, big business taxes, rather than increasing the deeply regressive CARTA fees.

So again, I will vote yes on the substitution and make that motion after this vote is decided.

Thank you.

Are there additional comments?

Councilmember Herbold?

I do feel a great deal of urgency associated with acting on the city auditor's recommendations.

We don't have a lot of options before us to address maintenance.

just a little bit of history on our funding sources for SDOT.

Some folks might recall that the 2015 move levy was set up differently than the previous bridging the gap levy.

The previous levy dedicated a higher proportion of funds to maintaining our critical transportation infrastructure than the current move levy does.

And I think that is part of why we're in the position that we're in right now.

The move levy goes all the way through 2024. So what that means is the council will not have the opportunity to address levy funding and increasing transportation infrastructure maintenance, a major funding source for that until 2024, and other options for dedicated transportation funding are limited.

And I'm just having a hard time with the recommendation that we turn over to a citywide transportation stakeholder group.

the question of whether or not we use these funds to address the recommendations of our City Auditor.

The City Council, I think, is charged with making the tough decisions about how to address recommendations from the City Auditor.

It's up to Council and the Mayor to implement those recommendations, and Seattle Municipal Code 3.40.050 reads under the section called audit reports, follow up required.

It says it is city policy to follow up on audit reports by the city auditor.

I'm concerned that this creates a troubling precedent that undermines this policy and undermines the seriousness that we are supposed to, with which we are supposed to consider the recommendations of the city auditor and act on it.

And again, I just don't think we should be turning over the question of how to identify the funding to address these recommendations to a city-wide stakeholder group.

I think there's been some conversation about funds that are unspent and are available to add transit capacity.

We know that there is about a $20 million reserve from unspent funds from the Transportation Benefit District that could be available in 2021 for adding additional transit services if it's needed.

We do know that there's a 60% reduction in use of transit right now because of COVID-19.

And the SDOT transportation benefit district plan itself sort of parks $8 million that we thought we would be using for transit in 2021, again, because of this concern that we should not be moving forward and committing to spend dollars for capacity until we know that we actually need it.

The moment I heard that one of SDOT's concerns about pursuing a $47 million repair for their West Seattle bridge was in large part due to the $500,000 annual maintenance cost, which is twice the maintenance cost estimate for a new bridge.

That's when I asked myself, why would we build a new bridge at nearly 10 times the cost to primarily avoid the higher cost of maintaining the bridge that we have, especially if the experts tell us that we can get another 30 to 40 years out of the bridge that we have.

And the answer to that question is because SDOT's not confident that we are going to fulfill our obligation to adequately fund maintenance.

Learning this really felt like a challenge to me to do my part to be a better steward of our public assets.

I think Councilmember Pedersen handled the issue of whether or not bridges are car-centric.

I reject that notion.

We are proposing to focus funding on bridges that are part of our our frequent transit network.

In the example of the West Seattle Bridge, just as an example of one bridge and how it functions like many, many others do in the frequent transit network, the West Seattle Bridge, when it was open, carried 13 different bus lines.

17,000 people and 900 different trips every day.

That bridge is a transit workhorse, and to suggest that our bridge infrastructure is I think that is something that we need to really struggle with that definition if we are ever going to do a better job of maintaining these failing public assets.

I'll chime in here very briefly before turning it back over to, and then I see Council Member Lewis.

I want to thank Councilmember Peterson, Herbold, and Lewis for bringing forward the initial piece of, I was going to say legislation, and also the CBA included in this consent package.

I'm obviously supportive of the efforts.

That's why it was in the initial proposal here for us to have it as part of the consent package.

But I'm even more supportive of the proposed amendment by the council president here today.

I think we all know that there's a huge need for additional transportation funding from transit services to services.

for essential workers, to safe infrastructure for people who are walking and biking, to making sure that we have the bridge maintenance necessary to ensure the long-term viability of our infrastructure.

And I do want to correct my earlier statement.

I do not think it should go unsaid that we know that folks who use transit, who are using our buses, they need their bridges to function.

I know having biked over the lower bridge here in West Seattle and walked over the lower bridge, that bridge has to function for pedestrians and bikers as well.

So I want to make sure to correct my earlier statement that I don't want to pit infrastructure against key other infrastructure investments in our city.

And I think that that's an important clarification.

I think Council Member Herbold, you alluded to it, and I want to just call it out directly.

Those who are using bikes and walking, running, and transit, they also use our bridges, and it connects our city.

It's incredibly important.

But transparency and inclusion as we make these decisions about taxpayer dollars is also important for me to comment on.

I'm supportive of the effort to make sure that we're pulling together a table to make sure that there is a inclusive conversation about identifying strategies for investing in key infrastructure, and that includes bridge maintenance.

The conversation will include additional state and federal sources that we're looking at to make sure that there is a robust plan for how we best leverage these vehicle license fees.

and I support the council president's amendment because I think that it helps lift up the importance of having folks who are able to come to the table very quickly in early 2021 and have us not miss a beat.

The ability to pull together a task force is not going to delay us because we see already that the estimated timeline, if we pass the vehicle license fee today, It will take six months to begin collecting the VLF revenue for vital transportation services and infrastructure.

So I am supportive of passing the increased package today while we also initiate this inclusive conversation.

And we've specified here with labor, with transportation equity groups, with transportation advisory boards and commissions to create a plan, a spend plan for the council to engage in a public and transparent and deliberative process.

I would like to thank the council for their support.

Again, there is incredible crossover among various stakeholders who have already expressed support for the process outlined in the Council President's proposal here.

In addition to hearing from the I think they are also interested in making sure that we get investments in bridges.

They have been very clear about that.

And other infrastructure is important as well.

And they would like to sit at the table and have these discussions because they also see that the data is going to continue to come up.

We are going to be able to help look at the data and make data-informed decisions through a collaborative process with the stakeholder table.

As the council president noted, if there is a reduction in the timeline, not an expansion, I would be very supportive of that as well.

because we still have about a six-month process.

So as long as we are staying within that six-month time frame and getting those recommendations even earlier, great.

I would like to see this as a replacement to the item that was originally considered in the consent package.

Again, I think this conversation has been spurred by the folks who brought this forward.

I would love to do that in a way that is more inclusive through the stakeholder process as identified in the amendment.

Councilmember Lewis, I believe you are next.

I do just briefly want to say that generally I'm very supportive in a lot of the policies that I've been promoting here over the last year to develop stakeholder processes that involve a broad array of advocates and people whose interests are going to be affected by city policy.

This is a little different for me today because the way I see it, and Council Member Herbold alluded to this, We are acting on a recommendation from the auditor to reach a goal that has been laid out with a sense of urgency that has been made very stark and apparent by the failure of the West Seattle Bridge.

One point that I want to make from reviewing that audit is while only five bridges are listed in poor condition, five too many, and no city should tolerate having five bridges in poor condition, there's 50 bridges listed as fair.

It should be noted the West Seattle Bridge was not historically considered a bridge in poor condition, and that, you know, an ounce of prevention can be worth a pound of cure, because these 50 fair bridges of today are the poor bridges of tomorrow unless we take assertive action to maintain them adequately.

And it really, I think the audit underscores that there is an infrastructure time bomb that the city is facing and that we have chronically underinvested in.

The minimum that the audit identified was $34 million.

This proposal of the VLF fee combined with some of the other resources the council is investing will get us to 18 million, I believe, which is still far short of that minimum recommendation from the auditor.

So, you know, I think it's really important.

I think it's something that we should move on now to make this investment with certainty that the department the Transportation Department needs to be able to really scale up and maintain this vital and important infrastructure.

We've seen the impact of historically under-investing in these bridges manifested this year with the West Seattle Bridge.

Twenty years ago after the Nisqually quake, it was the Magnolia Bridge that had a long-term shutdown.

There's a number of other bridges that have been experiencing problems.

The Ballard Bridge has been stuck in the up position several times in recent months.

The university bridge is on the poor list, and similarly a drawbridge that could have similar problems.

And I just want to make sure that we're not putting ourselves in a position where by refusing to pay today, we'll pay a bigger price with unplanned closures down the road if we don't start making more strategic investments in this really critical area.

I also just want to note that We do still have more CARTAB authority that could be voter approved as is indicated on the Transportation Benefit District sheet.

I know there's been a lot of talk about potentially doing a countywide CARTAB measure to backfill the fare subsidy loss that we've experienced from not having the luxury of being able to do that renewal because of the pending litigation when we had to put the Transit Benefit District renewal on the ballot.

I'd be interested in pursuing a countywide measure like that, and if that's not possible, in pursuing a citywide measure.

And I think that that's just one more tool in addition to the tools that Councilmember Furbold and Peterson enumerated earlier that could be pursued for fare subsidy and other critical transportation investments.

But in the meantime, I think this fairly more modest $3.6 million investment would be well suited to give the Department of Transportation a leg up in continuing to make these really important investments in bridges all over the city and in all of our districts.

So with that, I don't have anything else to add and appreciate the conversation.

Excellent.

Thank you.

Council President, would you like to close out discussion here?

I would.

Thank you.

I'll just make a quick rebuttal to some of the arguments that were raised by those who spoke this afternoon, I guess, late afternoon.

It's almost four o'clock.

OK, really quickly, I think the the the sponsors and supporters of the original Council budget action all went through a long list of bridge maintenance needs at the city.

And I think that the inference there is that I somehow don't believe that there is a need to maintain our bridges in the city of Seattle.

And I just want to I want to say for the record that that that is not an accurate characterization of my position.

There is no question in my mind that bridge maintenance is a need throughout the city that of course was bolstered by the recent city auditor findings that conclude that there is approximately $100 million worth of bridge maintenance that needs to occur throughout the city.

So if my substitute, which endeavors to.

acknowledge that bridge maintenance is needed, but also wants to see a stakeholder process be undertaken is being read as a denial of the need for bridge maintenance.

I want to encourage my colleagues or I want to communicate to my colleagues that that is not the case.

I agree that there is a need for bridge maintenance.

And so when Council Member Peterson says that we don't need a stakeholder process to determine whether our bridges are breaking, That's not what the stakeholder process is designed to do as I'm proposing it.

The stakeholder process, I believe, is necessary in order to guide city council decision-making around what the best use of this additional vehicle license fee would be.

It is the case that the stakeholders could determine that bridge maintenance is one of those things that should be prioritized.

And it would be my hope that those recommendations would also include levels of appropriate appropriation of how to spend those additional dollars on bridge maintenance given the need identified by the city auditor office.

I will note for the record and for consideration by council members who may be undecided on this issue that when the vehicle license fee was first instituted in 2011, there was a community and stakeholder process that was undertaken in order to devise and come up with a spending plan.

And that was done before the city council adopted the spending plan.

And so I think that we are out of step by not doing that in this instance and instead identifying council member, individual council member priorities for purposes of capturing these dollars and using these dollars for Only bridges and so I just want to acknowledge that that's a historical piece of information that I did receive from as thought as it relates to the prior process related to developing the spending plan for the VLF.

So that's 1 point.

I wanted to make in terms of the need.

There was also an argument made that it would be a dereliction of our duty to delegate this to a stakeholder process when we have a city auditor report telling us that it's an issue and we have an obligation to address it.

I agree that we have an obligation to address the issues identified by the city auditor as it relates to bridge maintenance, but I suppose I have a difference of opinion on whether or not having a stakeholder process as part of our responsibility and response to addressing the concerns and the needs identified by the city auditor as being a dereliction of duty.

I believe that the City Auditor's report did not say that bridge maintenance is paramount and the most important thing as compared to other things.

I think there's still sort of an opportunity of flexibility even in light of the City Auditor's findings that allow the City Council to exercise its discretion in determining how to allocate and whether to allocate certain types of revenue sources to certain types of needs in the instance of the City Auditor report.

the needs of bridge maintenance.

So I wanted to address that really quickly.

Third, I heard Councilmember Peterson mention that this budget action is only about $3.6 million and that it's just for 2021. I want to be really clear that that is not actually what this bill does.

This bill is $3.6 million, not just for 2021, but for every year after that, it would allocate $3.6 million at a minimum for every year after the passage of this bill.

In addition, it's my belief and understanding that the sponsors intended to capture not just the $3.6 million, but the full $7.2 million.

And that belief is based on the following quote that comes from the press release that was issued by the sponsors, which reads, quote, the legislation would raise an additional $3.6 million in 2021 and an additional $7.2 million in subsequent years.

The council members proposed to direct the additional funding to bridges with high frequency public transit close quote.

So it is my belief that the intent behind this bill is to capture every dollar generated from the vehicle licensing license fee in both 2021 and in the out years.

for purposes of bridge maintenance, and I have the intent in black and white right in front of me.

So that's the third point I wanted to make.

The fourth issue I wanted to address is the issue that Chair Mosqueda, you addressed about an insinuation that bridges are only for single-occupancy vehicles.

I, of course, don't believe that that is a true principle.

We are a city that is surrounded by water and that has water dispersed throughout our city.

And I, myself, personally understand the impact of the West Seattle Bridge in particular, as is a huge need for maintenance.

and for repair and potential replacement.

And so I don't want it to go and said that just because I'm advancing this substitute that somehow I believe that bridges are only for single occupancy vehicle.

That's not true at all.

And so I agree with the proponents of the original council bill who feel strongly that bridges are in fact part of our transportation network.

Lastly, Chair, I will end with the questions related to the length of the stakeholder process as originally proposed in my substitute bill.

It is a six-month, technically it's a five-month stakeholder process with a six-month being passage of a spending plan.

I am happy to make a verbal amendment now to modify that stakeholder process to three months.

Likewise, if that is not consistent with the procedures set out by the chair and with Council Central staff's expectations and preferences, I would give my word to the council members and stay here publicly that I would intend to bring a amendment forward for consideration on Monday to amend the substitute to have a three-month stakeholder process rather than a five-month stakeholder process.

I'm happy to do that in any way that you all feel would be procedurally appropriate.

Thank you for suggesting that.

Now is a perfect time to make that verbal amendment.

I'm a fan of trying to put a bow around things so we can move on to the next one if that is your intent.

I'd love to do that now.

Just as we maybe tee up the ability to do that between Ali and Calvin, I will just also note on the fourth item that you mentioned regarding bridges being car-centric.

I believe that was a reference to something I had said in the last two weeks.

So I just owned it and I corrected my statement because I want to make sure folks know we understand transit, pedestrian, bikes, all sorts of multimodal options rely on bridges as well.

So thank you for calling that out, council members, and happy to have my statement corrected.

Just before we go on to additional comments, I want to make sure that Ali and Cal, you have what you need for receiving a verbal amendment to change six to three.

I believe so.

I just want to confirm that it would be to change the SDOT's engagement with the community groups to April 1st and then have a council approve the spending plan a month later.

Is that correct?

Yeah.

Oops.

Yes, I think that would be correct.

Okay, so before we take that motion officially, Council Member Herbold, I see your hand up.

Thank you.

I'll make it super quick.

I just want to say two things for the record.

One, my correction regarding whether or not bridges are car-centric were not directed to either council member, council chair Mosqueda, nor council president Gonzalez.

It was in response to things that I heard in public comment today.

And then secondly, I just want to clarify the legislative intent is in the council bill itself.

and it does not allocate funding to bridges in perpetuity.

The action as it relates specifically to the council budget action, it relates to 2021, and that is the action that, as I understand it, and Cal, please correct me if I'm wrong, that is the action that expresses our intent for one year.

because I too have been saying I'm willing to revisit the issue of the other 3.6 million in future years.

Council members, just speaking to the legislation itself, the legislation authorizes the expenditure for any eligible transportation purpose.

So the revenue stream is not obliged.

The council budget action would direct the 2021 revenues towards bridge maintenance, and it does not speak to future years.

Thank you so much.

Council President, we have in front of us your substitute BLG042B001.

Would you like to make a motion for a verbal amendment to the date?

I would.

I would like to make a motion to amend the dates for the stakeholder process to require that the stakeholder process conclude on or before April 1st of 2021 and that would require the council take final action on the spending plan on or before May 1st, 2021. Second.

The verbal amendment has been moved and seconded.

Are there any additional comments on the verbal amendment to council bill substitute BLG042B001?

For the record, I did second, but I also want to add that Council President Gonzalez, everyone knows you care about bridge maintenance.

Thank you.

Because I need a bridge to get into.

I know you do.

That's why I'm laughing.

I know you want that bridge girl.

Maybe two.

Councilmember Peterson, did you have a comment?

Yes, I just wanted to.

The amendment, as I understand it, it's it's on or before, so a faster process could actually take place.

OK, because that's correct.

I think five months from today is when it would be enacted.

So if something happened faster.

It's on or before, so thank you for clarifying.

Excellent, any additional clarifying questions or comments?

I'm sorry.

Do we have a motion in a second already?

Yes, we do.

Thank you so much.

I just want to say for the record, my concern is not about the length of the process.

My concern is about opening up the use of this revenue source to other uses other than bridge maintenance.

I think one way for us all to show how much we care about bridge maintenance is not introducing a process that might conceivably could result in no money for bridge maintenance.

So thank you.

So the item is moved and seconded to amend the proposed substitute, and that way we will have the accurate reflected substitute in front of us.

And then colleagues, I'm going to call through whether or not you want to include this substitute, and then we would vote on the substitute.

So there's three votes, if I'm correct.

in front of us, and I'm seeing nods from central staff.

That's always helpful.

So right now, we are amending the proposed substitute to include on or before April 1st, which shortens the timeline for the stakeholder process.

This is a verbal amendment to BLG042B001.

Seeing no additional comments, will the clerk please call the roll on the verbal amendment to BLG042B001?

Lewis?

Aye.

Morales.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

Yes.

Juarez.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Gonzalez.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Yes.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries and the substitute is amended as described.

Okay, colleagues, now we are going to consider moving the substitute in front of us.

Before I request the clerk to call the roll on the motion to substitute, I want to remind folks that council members that a yes vote or an aye vote is to reject the version on the agenda and a no vote is to reject the substitute.

Okay.

So if you want to include the substitute language that we just discussed and amended then you would vote aye to substitute.

If you want to keep the original language as presented on the agenda you would vote no.

Anything else to add Madam Clerk or Ali before we continue.

Okay.

Wait I'm sorry.

Can you say that one more time just that it's clear in my head.

Yes.

Ali would you like to.

If you vote yes, you're voting on the motion to substitute.

So your version would be before the committee after that vote.

If you vote no, you're retaining the original item as published to the agenda and sponsored by Council Member Peterson.

Thank you.

We always want to make sure that that's clear because this is where it gets tricky at the end of a long day.

Okay.

I'm seeing no additional hands.

Will the clerk please call the roll on the motion to substitute?

Lewis.

No.

Morales.

Yes.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

No.

Juarez.

No.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

No.

Gonzales.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Yes.

the motion carries.

We have five in favor, four opposed.

The motion carries.

BLG042B001 as amended is now before us.

Are there any additional comments before final vote on this item?

Thank you, Council Member Sawant.

It's been moved, is there a second?

Seconded.

Okay, it's been moved and seconded.

Council Member Sawant, you are recognized to describe your amendment to the amended substitute.

Thank you.

As I mentioned earlier, this substitution does not change the spending plans and procedures in any way.

And to be clear, that means that I would also accept the same verbal amendment to make the stakeholder process three months instead of five months that was just adopted in CBA BLG 42B1.

What it changes in this amendment is where the money comes from increasing progressive taxes on big business instead of taxes on working people.

Washington state in general And Seattle in particular has had one of the most regressive tax systems in the nation with poor and working class people paying a far higher portion of their paychecks in local taxes than the rich.

Council members often lament the regressive taxes, but it took a grassroots mass movement, movement leadership independent of the establishment, and 30,000 signatures for the threat of a viable ballot initiative to ultimately force big business and the political establishment to concede on the Amazon tax.

In this case, the city council has a very clear choice between a regressive or a progressive tax and I urge council members to vote yes on this substitution for the progressive option.

The vehicle license fee, commonly known as car tabs, is one of the most deeply regressive and punishing taxes on working people.

And because it is so deeply regressive, precisely because it is so deeply regressive and it is hated, correctly so, by ordinary people, by poor people, right-wing figures like Tim Eyman end up being able to cynically tap into that anger, the genuine anger, to attack essential transit funding.

When I say car tabs are punishing, I mean that literally.

Poor people go to jail for the crime of poverty because of unpaid car tabs.

If you cannot afford your car tabs, you can get a very expensive ticket, even if your car is just parked on the street.

And since people who have trouble affording car tabs are also often poor enough not to have driveways or private parking, that happens a lot.

Then if you do not pay the ticket for expired car tabs, the state revokes your driver's license.

Then if you need to drive to work without a license anyway, which you very likely do because you also have now been pushed farther and farther away from your work because of skyrocketing rents, you are now driving without a license, which is a gross misdemeanor.

I wanted to relate actually a personal experience from Ted Verdon, one of the staff members in my office, who had to go to court four times when he was charged with a misdemeanor because of car tabs.

Eventually, his charge was reduced to a traffic infraction after the fourth court date.

But you can imagine what an onerous burden this places on ordinary people, especially when many of them are holding two jobs, now many of them facing unemployment.

In 2015, I was arrested alongside other activists from the $15 minimum wage struggle while engaging in nonviolent direct action in SeaTac to demand Alaska Airlines abide by the $15 minimum wage law.

In my jail cell, virtually all of the 8 to 10 women in my cell were in jail because of traffic and car-related violations and expired car tabs, as the original reason was a common theme.

This is anecdotal, but we have overwhelming statistical evidence of the consequences of regressive taxes on working and poor people and on our society as a whole.

Yes, we need revenues for buses and bridges, but there is absolutely no reason for the City Council to keep approving regressive taxes like car tabs We already have the Amazon tax.

The council approved this this summer.

Amazon is reporting record profits.

Amazon is not the only company reporting straggling profits.

There are many others and we could easily increase the taxes by a minuscule degree on them instead.

Finally, I would like to explain the technical details of how this substitute budget amendment works because my office has also submitted three other budget amendments using a similar approach, which is using the Amazon tax, an increase in the Amazon tax to achieve a certain funding goal.

The Amazon tax, technically called a payroll tax that our movement won this past summer, taxes big business in six different tiers depending on the size of the business and depending on the size of the salaries of their highest paid employees.

Those six tiers each have a tax rate.

This budget amendment and similarly the other three budget amendments that my office has proposed would add in a proportional way to the tax rate in each of those six tiers.

Because these budget amendments add to the tax rate, they can each be considered separately, and support for one of those amendments neither requires support for nor conflicts with any of the other amendments to increase the tax rate.

Each amendment stands alone.

For this budget amendment, not surprisingly, mathematically, The increases to the big business tax rates are extremely small.

In fact, when my office was preparing this amendment, we needed to add smaller decimal places because otherwise the increases were all rounding up to zero.

rounding to zero.

This budget amendment would add the following to the big business tax rates.

For businesses whose total payroll is from $7 million to $100 million, salaries of their employees from $150,000 to $400,000 annually, the tax rate increase would be 0.012%.

For salaries over $400,000 annually, it would be 0.029%.

For businesses with a total payroll of $100 million to $1 billion, the salaries from $150,000 to $400,000, the increase would be 0.012%.

Salaries over $400,000, 0.032.

And now for the payroll companies that exceeds, for companies for whom the payroll exceeds $1 billion, the salaries from 150 to 400, the increase would be 0.024% and salaries over 400,000 would be 0.04%.

As council members can see, These are absolutely minuscule tax rates for corporations, especially that have actually been reporting unprecedented profits since April.

So I really hope that council members will support this and, you know, really just break away from the regressive tax measures once and for all.

and I've heard council members in the last hour of discussion saying that this is nothing new or just because somebody something was done in the past doesn't make it right.

Regressive taxes have always been bad.

Car tabs have always been one of the most punishing taxes.

City Council should break from it and increase the Amazon tax rate.

Thank you.

Thank you Council Member Sawant.

It's been moved and seconded to consider your amendment, your substitute BLG042C001.

Is there any additional comments?

Okay.

Seeing none, Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on BLG042C001?

Lewis?

No.

Morales?

No.

Sawant?

Yes.

Peterson.

No.

Juarez.

Sorry, no.

Strauss.

No.

Herbold.

No.

Gonzales.

No.

Chair Mosqueda.

No.

One in favor, eight opposed.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

The motion fails and BLG042C001 is not approved.

That leaves us with BLG042B001 as verbally amended in front of us.

Are there any additional comments on the motion?

motion before final passage.

Again, this is related to vehicle license fees and the committee that has been set up in a shorter time frame to provide recommendations, including recommendations on bridges and other infrastructure.

Okay, I am seeing no additional hands.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the approval of BLG042B001 as amended?

Lewis?

Yes.

Morales.

Yes.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

Abstain.

Juarez.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

No.

Gonzales.

Aye.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

One abstention, one no, seven ayes.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries.

And BLG042B001, as amended, is approved.

And it will be part of the amendment consent package.

Let's go ahead to the next item, hoping this will be relatively quick and we can get through a few more here tonight.

Madam, Madam Ali, would you like to read item 136FG003B001 and any additional context would be helpful.

Thank you.

So this was item 136 on the agenda, FG3B1, which would impose a proviso on $29.9 million in finance general for the equitable communities initiative.

I believe this item was removed from the package and that there will be a substitute to make a correction because the wrong version of this amendment was posted to the agenda and there are some corrections to the to the proviso.

So once you move this item, so it's before the committee, I'll ask my colleague, Asha, to just describe what is, and then once you move the item and then make the motion to substitute, I will ask my colleague, Asha, to describe the specific differences between the original item and the substitute version.

Thank you very much.

I move that Council Bill Council Budget Action FG003B001B, remove.

Wait for an official vote.

I already did that.

Okay, let me move on to the next part of my script here.

I move to substitute Council Budget Action FG003B002 and put this in Let me try this again, Kali.

I would like to insert substitute FG003B002 in place of FG003B001.

Madam Chair, I think maybe I missed it.

I think you first need to move approval of FG3B1, and then you move to substitute.

OK.

Madam Chair, I believe you're right.

Just for the sake of clarity, let's move the original version first and then move the substitute.

Thank you.

Got it.

OK.

Let's try this again, folks.

Get into that point of the day where I am making things more complicated.

I move that Council Budget Action FG003B001 be removed for an individual vote.

This does not require a second or a vote that allows for it to be in front of us.

I'm sorry, Chair.

The motion would be to adopt that you would motion to vote to consider the item since it's already been removed.

And then we would motion to substitute.

All right, folks.

Bear with me here.

I move to substitute.

Does that sound right?

I'm happy to make the motion.

Thank you, Council President.

Yeah, I move the adoption of FG003B001.

Second.

Now you can move your substitute.

Okay, it's been moved and seconded.

Before we move on with discussion, I would like to move to substitute FG003B002 in place of FG003B001.

It's been moved and seconded.

Thank you very much for your support, colleagues, in getting through that.

We now have FG003B002 in front of us, inadvertently had the wrong item uploaded, and I apologize for that.

I'll turn it over to Ali, and then I'll provide a little bit of explanation.

Thank you, Chair Mosqueda.

If my colleague Asha is on the line, could you please describe what is the changes between version one and version two that is the substitute?

So in version one, in the first proviso that's listed, so Patty, if you could scroll down just onto the second page, the first version had indicated that in that proviso for the $29.5 million that the authority wouldn't be granted until the executive submitted to the council a plan for spending the funds that described how the allocations were informed by and reflected alignment between the task force's recommendations and the dispensatory budgeting process's recommendations.

The new version that is intended for passage only asks that the plan be submitted with the plan for spending the funds that describes how the allocations were informed and then expects that there would be alignment between the participatory budgeting process and the task force's process.

So the difference is just in the new version, it's expecting alignment around the processes rather than expecting alignment around the recommendations.

I think that there's actually a little bit more caveat there.

The most important takeaway here is that the council gets the final say and the recommendations we are expecting there to be, um, alignment with the conversations happening at the participatory budgeting process.

This is, um, the language that we have talked to various stakeholders about, and I want to make sure that we are in alignment, not only with the process, but also making sure that we as a council have a chance to look at alignment I would like to reiterate that there is not timelines associated with either process so the Council will still be able to keep a pulse on how those discussions are going within the more robust participatory budgeting process and make sure it is not Councilmembers, I don't see any additional comments.

Could the clerk please call?

Councilmember Mosqueda, I apologize.

There was a comment from Councilmember Herbold.

Oh, hi, Councilmember Herbold.

I'm sorry.

I had my camera off and I had my hand up in the air.

I just want to clarify what we're talking about as it relates to alignment.

There was a Equal Communities Initiative Task Force meeting yesterday, and I feel like I gave We had a lot of conversations with the council about what the council's expectations were.

And said that, you know, our proviso could have a lot of different expectations.

I'm just concerned that this language, the expectation that there will what message we're sending with this language.

Are we talking about alignment of timetables or are we talking about the alignment of processes?

I believe it's the alignment of processes and I'm sorry, alignment of timetables to make sure that there is synergy.

We are not directing there to be anything that feeds into participatory budgeting and to alleviate that concern as well.

We have also checked in with the executive's office to make sure that this doesn't get crosswise with those conversations we had previously, and have confirmed even this afternoon, inadvertently having the wrong version uploaded, that we were on the same page still.

So thank you for clarifying that.

Thank you so much.

And given my comments about my concern, I don't want to suggest that there isn't interest in alignment around processes.

But I think whether or not that's going to happen or not is dependent on pending conversations that haven't happened yet.

And I just don't want to tie these investments to the outcomes of conversations that haven't happened.

That's right.

I put it as an invitation, but there is no directive.

So thank you for that additional context.

OK.

So we now have FG003B002 in front of us.

Is there any additional comments?

Thank you.

Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll on this substitute?

Lewis.

Aye.

Morales.

Aye.

I'm sorry, Morales?

Yes.

Thank you.

Sawant?

Yes.

Peterson?

Yes.

Juarez?

Yes.

Strauss?

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Gonzalez?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Yes.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you very much, colleagues.

That was the motion to substitute.

appreciate you putting that item in front of us now.

The motion carries and substitute FG003B002 is in front of us for final vote.

Are there any additional comments?

Seeing none, will the clerk please call the roll on the final vote of FG003B002.

Lewis.

Aye.

Morales.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

Yes.

Juarez.

Yes.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Gonzalez.

Aye.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries.

And FG003B002.

the motion carries and is approved.

Let's see if we can get at least one more item into our agenda for today.

Moving on to item 141.

and this item was sponsored by Council Member Sawant.

Excellent, thank you very much.

I am going to turn it over to Council Member Peterson for discussion about the removal, and then I will turn it over to Council Member Sawant.

Just remind me, there is not a substitute on this one, is there?

This is for the purpose of discussion, Council Member Peterson.

Correct.

OK, great.

I just want to make sure I had my script ready.

And just in case, given that I was fumbling through that last time.

So for the purposes of discussion and greater clarification, we'd love to hear more from you.

Council member Peterson, if you'd like to talk about the items that you would like to feature on this before we turn it over to the sponsor.

Just to clarify the process at this point, on these items, these are items that were pulled from the group B consent package.

Correct.

So in this case, I wanted to pull it because I'll be voting no on it.

But I wanted to support the rest of the consent package.

Excellent.

OK.

Just a couple of sentences on my thoughts here.

That's welcome.

Yes.

Thank you.

Okay, so I know we all want to reduce homelessness in Seattle and we've got different approaches and perspectives on this and we've read different studies and we've seen different things in our own districts and I worked at the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

So I've seen things from the perspective of applying for competitive grant proposals to reduce homelessness.

And I just have a particular focus on investing on what's proven to work best.

There are some emerging ideas.

And certainly for me, it was an evolving position on tiny home villages.

And I've got a different very specific perspective on that in terms of wanting robust case management, wanting to be focused on exiting people to permanent housing that's affordable.

We will be putting a tiny home village in the university district.

Wallingford was very welcoming of the tiny home village that was there for over the past two years.

There are different ways to do tiny home villages.

My concern with this proposal is in reading the budget action description that it's potentially going to organizations that may not have the infrastructure to receive and manage the funding from human services department.

So it's asking to identify non-traditional ways of awarding these funds.

And I just, I feel like there are enough proven strategies that could use the funding in terms of like an enhanced shelter model, I'm not sure if it's something with robust case management or tracking the outcomes.

It's a different orientation that I have on it.

I will be voting no on this particular proposal.

I will turn it back over to Councilmember Sawant for further discussion and comments.

I've already spoken at length about the importance of tiny house villages as a whole.

But earlier today, I also talked about how there is not only one model, that there are self-managed models and there are models that aren't modeled on those lines.

And we have a lot of This is the testimonials from residents themselves.

These are not our opinions that we have crafted in the safety of our homes, but this is the overwhelming testimony of the residents and the past residents of the Nicholsville villages about how the self-managed villages, the self-managed component is what suited them better, and that it helped them overcome the crushing isolation Councilmember Peterson mentioned the tiny house village in Wallingford, I believe.

In fact, the tiny house village in Wallingford is an example that would be funded with these funds because it is a Nicholsville tiny house village.

We have my office have talked to Share wheel and Nicholsville.

They have authorized villages that receive, they have, I mean, these villages are authorized villages, but they currently receive no support from the city.

And those villages, if we give them financial support would be really transformed by electricity.

tiny houses, garbage services, and hygiene trailers.

So this budget amendment is about providing funds to concretely improve people's lives.

Can the city help an authorized encampment get electricity, get sanitation, upgrade tents to tiny houses?

Get a hygiene trailer with laundry and showers.

These are these are the components we are talking about.

I mean, density three, for example, does not yet have tiny houses, but it is still an important community for its residents.

And in fact, especially in the time of covert.

I think we should be doing everything in our power to enable the different models that have a proven track record of success because what's even more important right now is that the tiny house villages are actually helping people keep COVID infections at bay.

We've heard this and this is so important as our city and region heads into I would say that the fact that the city has maintained utilities We have been advocating for.

Any discomfort that may be experienced in my view pales in comparison with the discomfort and suffering of the residents of Northlake if they were to lose their utilities.

These are all, I mean, these are not real things.

I mean, no case management is going to be lost.

This budget amendment does not remove case management from any shelter.

These funds are to support more humane conditions in already authorized encampments.

They do not take funding away from case management.

And in fact, we would support, and my office has consistently supported, adding case management services whenever that is possible.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you very much.

Is there additional comments of Councilmember Herbold?

Thank you.

I just I have a couple questions.

Is the intention to make a distinction between encampments, tent encampments and tiny house villages here?

Is that is that part of the intent?

No, there was there was no intention.

We just want both models to be supported.

So encampments includes tiny house villages.

Yes.

Okay.

Well, you know, I'm not I'm not opposed to this.

I do have a question about the fund source, but I just want to clarify that, you know, even tiny house villages that are don't have as their fiscal agent, multi-million dollar organizations, and including those that do, they all consider themselves self-managed.

So my tiny house village here in District 1, the fiscal agent is Lehigh, but they definitely consider themselves self-managed.

So if you are intending this to go to something other than a Lehigh-sponsored encampment, I think the language needs to be different.

The tiny camps at Kachanset here in West Seattle, they have their own rules and that they have a process for enforcing those rules.

And I think there's a difference of opinion of sort of scales of self-management that we've seen among different hosts of tiny house villages and tent encampments.

So if the intent is for this to not go to a self-management tiny house village that an organization like Lehigh is the fiscal sponsor for, then I think the language needs to be something different.

I agree with you.

I think self-management of encampments is why we have such an evolved and sophisticated model that is working right now because of the history of city support for sanctioned encampments.

It has allowed for this evolution of a model that is providing outcomes.

My question related to the fund source, though, is I see that the funds for this action come from specifically the funds associated with one of the items in the I would like to make a motion.

that includes specific funding in order to both relocate 425 additional people from unsafe conditions into safe lodging with either temporary hotels and enhanced shelters, and specifically identifying the 125 enhanced shelter beds as one additional strategy and complementing the sheltering.

the hoteling strategy.

So I'm just...

We have sort of, you know, we adopted this item earlier in the consent package.

It is a very carefully negotiated sum of dollars in order to result in a particular outcome.

And it's been negotiated with stakeholders as well as the mayor's office.

We're trying to move forward together and, you know, really trying to that out on a new approach, rather than having a lot of conflict associated with how we address unsanctioned encampments.

And so I'm just concerned that if we are going to be taking money away from this already sort of negotiated and agreed upon amount, that there could be trouble ahead.

Great.

Yeah, let's get clarification on that because I believe it is additive.

This is not among those dollars.

So let's just double check.

Ali and Jeff, I see you both online.

I was going to ask Jeff to answer the question.

So excellent.

Thank you.

Yeah, to Council Member Herbold's first question, my understanding is correct, or that you're correct, that all of our sanctioned encampments, which we also call tiny home villages, would consider themselves self-managed.

And there's degrees to which that might be the case.

And so that's why the CBA's language says a self-managed encampment, and this is where I think it departs from the model typically utilized by Lehigh, that are not operated by a homelessness services agency.

I don't believe we would categorize groups like SHARE and Wheel and Nickelsville as homeless services agencies rather than it's maybe a more amorphous collaborative kind of concept of self-organization.

And so that's the intention between in the CBA to not talk about agencies that are funded such as Lehigh to operate tiny home villages.

And then to your second question, you're correct that the CBA HOM 5E I forget if it's one or two at this point.

But that one is the, that is the CBA that you referred to, that refers to this framework about outreach and unsheltered populations and providing services to them and moving forward.

That framework makes reference to opening 425 beds, and that includes the 300 beds proposed by the mayor using ESG funds in hotels, and then also a new 125-bed enhanced shelter.

And the $250,000 that are leveraged here just resulted from simple math.

According to HSD's own numbers, it costs about a little bit less than $20,000 for an enhanced shelter bed to be operated for an entire year.

You take $20,000 and you multiply it by 125, it's just a little bit less than $2.5 million.

Yet the mayor's proposed budget provided $2.75 million.

So there just seems to be some padding in there that with the absence of an actual location or other reasons to believe costs would exceed what is the average cost, that it seems that that could be reduced without actually having an impact on the operation of a 125-bed shelter as well.

Jeff, did you already comment?

The funding is additive, correct?

It's not...

a slice of the other two homelessness efforts that we talked about being in tandem just before we went on recess, our lunch break.

I believe by that you mean that this is in addition to the other pieces that are being funded.

So yes, all of these are operating separately.

This is not taking $250,000 from either of those two CBAs.

I would like to know if there are any additional clarifying questions or comments.

I'm sorry.

I'm pretty sure that we have been funding share wheel for many, many years under our homelessness investments and I'm pretty sure they are considered a homelessness provider agency.

Maybe that is something we can take a look at later.

Sure.

My understanding is actually the capital community services acts as the fiscal sponsor for sharing wheel because they don't have the capability of managing a city contract.

They don't meet all the qualifications and requirements.

And so we wouldn't technically call sharing wheel a agency as much as maybe a subcontractor or someone in partnership with who our fiscal sponsor, the actual agency is.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Okay.

Council member Swatt, would you like to close this out on this item?

Yes, thank you for the clarifying questions, and I really appreciate Jeff Sim's absolutely thorough answers.

I think that that was really great.

Just to add to what he said in terms of the question about self-management, I agree that there are different degrees of self-management and different kinds of setups might consider themselves self-managed.

The question is not so much about that.

I mean, the language in the amendment does not say self-management as a deciding factor.

The intent is for less formal villages, which is the, you know, so basically it covers both tiny home villages and the encampments that the human service department currently does not fund because they do not check all the boxes.

For example, not having a fiscal agent and so on.

So that's the deciding factor.

In the language of the amendment, the first sentence of this council budget action would support the operations of two self-managed encampments that are not operated by a homelessness services agency and would cover a range of potential encampment expenses, including utilities, hygiene facilities, moving expenses, so on, you know, so the whole package of things that they would need.

Thank you.

Thank you very much Councilmember Sawant.

Again, there is no substitute on this item.

This was pulled for the purposes of discussion.

The item is in front of us.

Council Budget Action HOM 021A001.

Seeing no additional comments or questions, I'd like to ask the clerk to please go ahead and call the roll on this item for inclusion in group B consent package.

Morales.

Aye.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

No.

Juarez.

Council Member Juarez.

I think that that's my fault for calling out being off of mute.

We'll come back in just a second before we wrap up.

Council Member Strauss.

Yes.

Council Member Herbold.

Yes.

Council Member Gonzalez.

Aye.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Let's go back to Council Member Juarez.

Council Member Juarez.

Oh, I see.

I see it accidentally went on mute again.

Wait one more second.

Sure.

Yeah, thanks so much.

And it is okay if the council member is not voting.

We are in committee, so to speak.

Oh, I am.

Oh, there you are.

I see.

I knew you were trying.

Okay.

Council Member Juarez.

Aye.

Eight in favor, one opposed.

Thank you very much, Madam Clerk and colleagues.

The item The item carries and there is approval of council bill HOM 021A001 as part of the consent amendment package.

Okay, so we have five minutes.

I believe one is for the purpose of discussion and one is a technical change that the council member wanted to see.

Let's see what we can do here.

Council Member Sawant has LAW-002A-001.

To put it in front of us, I move approval of LAW-002A-001 as included in Voting Group B's consent package.

Is there a second?

second.

It's been moved and seconded to approve the CBA.

I'm going to turn it over to Council Member Peterson who pulled this item for first comments.

Council Member Peterson, additional comments or questions?

I believe it was Council Member Herbold.

Oh, I apologize.

Council Member Herbold, additional comments or questions?

I apologize, Council Member Peterson.

Thank you so much, and I appreciate the opportunity for discussion on this one.

I just want to raise the fact that, first of all, as required by the Council Accountability Ordinance passed in 2017, It reads, in consultation with the OPA, the CPC, and the Chair of the Public Safety Committee, they will work to, they being the Office of the Inspector General, will solicit work plan suggestions.

Just recently, the OIG has written to solicit work plan suggestions from each, the OPA, the CPC, and myself.

The process of looking at changes to the accountability structure authority and process to make improvements is charged to the Office of the Inspector General.

And so it would be appropriate to request the Office of the Inspector General to research this issue.

I would be happy to submit this work plan suggestion on behalf of Council Member Sawant for OIG consideration and inclusion of this issue on her 2021 work plan.

As it relates to the statement of legislative intent as drafted, it commits central staff to working on a bill.

We all have 2021 and 2022 priorities, legislative priorities that central staff has not been able to dedicate time to.

I'm concerned that this budget proposal would assume to council asking law to research the issue.

I do not support having central staff work on the issue.

Secondly, as it relates to the comment, I'm concerned that this proposal assumes that the CPC is not fulfilling its charge as passed by the council in 2017. When in fact, the fulfillment of its charge has been blocked because of many of its proposals that haven't been implemented.

Some of those proposals depend on bargaining.

And that also goes for recommendations from the OPA and the OIG.

One example of when the CPC was far ahead of policymakers and the public relates to recommendations it made in years prior specifically related to protest management.

The police department made changes as it relates to crowd control, but not focused on protest management and enacting many of the recommendations that the CPC made.

Another example of the CPC being ahead of the general public and ahead of policymakers relates to the need to have the expertise of community members, expertise of community members with lived experiences interacting with the police department, that we should have them available as advisors to us on the LRPC, the Labor Relations Policy Committee, and they should be available for consultation with the Labor Relations Negotiating Team.

This is something that we have now enacted in consultation with the executive.

But this is an example of something that the CPC has been asking for for years.

And I just, I feel very strongly that their effectiveness should not be measured by whether or not their recommendations have been implemented.

We are working with the police department to make sure that we are providing the necessary support.

Secondly, I want to highlight that the council in January adopted resolution 31930 regarding negotiations with the police officers guild.

The resolution included recommendations from the community police commission, the inspector general and the office of police accountability.

I'm concerned that as drafted, there's the potential that it would allow anyone to run for election, including opponents of police reform.

And I'm concerned that if we approve this today, this could imply that council supports this as part of our bargaining.

It would, in any case, need to go through the consent decree process, which given approval, necessary approval of the three accountability bodies could be a barrier to going through the consent decree process.

And we cannot underestimate, it sounds like this is a small thing, but it is not a small thing.

It would completely reinvent police accountability in Seattle.

Again, we have three accountabilities that are about to participate with a formal role in negotiations with both the police management Association and the Police Officers Guild.

I'm concerned that researching this issue at this time and working to develop legislation would really undercut them and undercut their ability to be partners to us in these negotiations.

At the community police commission meeting this morning, co-chair Reverend Walden noted that the 2017 police accountability ordinance has not been fully implemented.

This is an ordinance that was sponsored by council president Gonzalez under her leadership and in partnership with the CPC.

And Reverend Walden also noted that the court has ordered the city to bring a methodology for police accountability and that has not yet been completed.

She also referenced some of the points that I made as it relates to the consent decree and potential impacts.

on the CP's role in negotiations with SPMA and SPOG.

So again, I would be open to a statement of legislative intent that only asks the law department to research this issue, or I would, should the statement of legislative intent not be passed today, I would also be happy to submit on behalf of the sponsor a request to the OIG I would like to hear from councilmember Herbold.

For her consideration and determination whether or not it is an appropriate item for her 2021 work plan.

Thank you.

Councilmember Herbold.

I have councilmember Sawant and council president.

Councilmember Sawant, any comments?

The last point that Councilmember Herbold made, and I want to make sure I understood it correctly.

Did you say that if the amendment was amended to say that just the city attorney's office was asked to do this research and that central staff time will not be used, that you would be okay with that?

Did I hear you right?

I would be open to considering it.

It is not something that I'd be willing to vote on today, though.

Okay.

So just to clarify on that one point, in fact, that is where my office started.

We had just said city attorney's office, but then in the process of drafting it alongside central staff, it was suggested that we should have central staff and city attorney's office, which I'm okay with it.

I wanted to be clear that in this amendment we are not just talking about research.

We want the city attorney's office to draft the legislation for it.

It is a substantive thing.

In fact, Council Member Herbold said that this is not a small thing.

It may seem like a small thing.

No, it does not seem like a small thing at all.

It is not a small thing.

As you said, it is completely reinventing police accountability.

And my response to that is it's high time the city council did something about this.

After having spent all year talking about Black Lives Matter and about police accountability and reimagining, you know, It is time to actually deliver on something.

It is not about measuring the community police commission.

It's not a judgment on their role.

It is merely the people's budget movement and my office trying to actually do something on police accountability.

And this body that is being proposed, for the research and the legislation development would not replace the Community Police Commission.

It would replace the Office of Professional Accountability.

So there's no conflict there.

And similarly, I mean, I agree that the CPC's effectiveness should not be measured by whether or not their recommendations have been adopted.

But that is precisely why we are recommending that the research and the legislation development happen in relation to an elected community oversight board.

Because it would be in terms of those elected members having to fight for re-election on the basis of whether or not they have delivered on the mandate of police accountability automatically sets them in a different situation than right now where all the agencies are reporting to the mayor's office, city council and the police and also are not independent of the police department.

So in other words, the intent is for this future office or board to be independent of the mayor's office the city council and the police department and making that an elected board, a board that is empowered democratically to hold police accountable.

And they need to be empowered to have full oversight over the police, to investigate, to subpoena, to discipline, to fire or hire All of that, they need to have the powers to do, which right now, this is a really murky process because the buck is being passed from one agency to another, from the city council to the mayor's office.

In reality, the city council has not delivered on its promises.

Two years ago, a racist police contract was adopted by all city council members at that time, except for my no vote.

And there are many instances where the community's voice has been ignored.

So I do not believe that having an elected body is a panacea, because it hasn't been.

The mayor and the city council are not just of this city, but city after city where promises were made to the Black Lives Matter movement and those promises were betrayed.

I don't believe that an elected body is a panacea.

But what I do think is that being an elected board for the explicit purpose and mandate of bringing about police accountability will mean that they are going to be answerable to voters because they themselves will be under pressure on one issue, not like the city council and the mayor, where politicians can do other somewhat progressive things and then run on those issues while actually letting people down on some critical issues like police accountability, like racism in the police department, like all the people who have been killed at the hands of the police and not one police officer having been brought to justice.

So I think that that's the substantive component of this.

I mean, we're also told that the Office of Professional Accountability and the Inspector General are independent oversight bodies because they are not led by sworn officers.

But the reality is that they're extensively tied to the structures of the police department.

And even if that were not true, they are certainly not independent of the mayor and the political establishment.

And I would also add, and this is a very important component of this discussion, which is that We are actually not going to be the first city to take some of these measures.

One of the features of this past election, the November election, has been the remarkable number of cities that had ballot measures related to police accountability.

Now, they're not all carbon copy of each other.

They don't, I don't believe any of them says elected, but the one thing that they're trying that all those ballot measures try to get to was the question of actually delivering accountability and they are accomplishing them in different ways.

Now, of course, those measures will be tested, you know, in actual time in terms of whether they deliver or not.

So, you know, I don't have a crystal ball on that, but it is a question of what those ballot measures have said and just to give you an example.

In San Diego, Measure B, they had a civilian oversight.

It changes the civilian oversight from the advisory community review board on police practices to commission on police practices, which would have the power to subpoena witnesses and conduct investigations into police officer misconduct.

Now, this has many of the elements that I'm talking about.

It's not an elected, but it actually is mandated with power by this ballot measure, by the voter, by voters' intent.

It would review complaints against officers and investigate all deaths that are a result of police interaction, including in-custody deaths.

And the commission, and this is where the substantive part comes in, the commission would be independent of the mayor and the city police department.

So that's one example.

But there have been many other measures that have been in Portland, in Oakland, in San Francisco, and other cities that I don't have time to get into.

So the point being that this is, yes, this is substantive, but it is absolutely necessary for us to do this, do something.

The current model is not working.

I don't, I really don't think anybody can make any honest claim that the current model is working because it's simply not working.

And again, I'm open to amendments which will bring in the, I'm open to saying independent of the mayor's office, city council and the police department, if you want to remove elected, that's fine.

I'm okay with having just the city attorneys look at it, office look at it.

I'm okay with some of those proposed changes if council members are open.

Council Member Swan, thank you.

I'm gonna turn it over to Council President who is up next and appreciate you all sticking in there.

Thank you, Council President, for waiting.

Sorry, toggling in between screens again.

I will make this quick because we are 11 minutes past our designated hour for adjournment.

But I just wanted to, as the council member who's been the public safety chair for the last four years and who was a prime sponsor of the 2017 police accountability ordinance.

Wanted to just signal my support for Councilmember Herbold's argument in opposition to this particular Item as included in the consent package.

And I, and I really want to encourage my colleagues to, um, Uh, to, to vote no on this particular item.

Um, for all of the reasons articulated by council member her bold.

question and conversation that needs to occur about whether or not the 2017 version of the accountability system that we passed is still relevant today.

I think that's a legitimate question to ask.

What I'm concerned about with this slide is that it presupposes what the answer should be to that question.

And so I'm fine.

supporting any efforts from a policy perspective, and frankly, I don't think a sly is required in order to have council members who want to do this body of work.

She can do it with or without the sly.

But I do think that the question should be broad from a policy perspective of saying, is the police accountability system that we designed and developed and adopted as a council unanimously?

in partnership with community, is that system still relevant in 2020?

And that's a different question than whether it's broken or fixed or needs fixing.

But my biggest concern with this slide is it presupposes that the answer to that question is that, yes, it is broken and, yes, it is no longer relevant.

And the answer, as devised by me, is to have this other radically different approach and system in place.

And so my preference would be to engage in true community outreach with the community partners, to comply with our consent decree obligations, and to not shy away from the overarching 30,000-foot question, as I just described it.

But I think it would be It would be premature to have this council as a whole signal its support for the particular approach described in and being advocated for in this particular budget action.

So I will not be supporting this particular item as part of the consent package.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you very much Council President.

Thank you Council Member Herbold as well for your description of the concerns here and Council Member Swann for your explanation of the intent here.

I think that this was a more robust conversation than I anticipated.

We are 15 minutes over.

I am going to motion to recess because this is a two-day meeting and I think that this requires a little bit wrapping up, make sure that we get done with this and Council Member Straus' item.

So we are going to go ahead.

Do we have a motion in front of us to vote on though?

We do have a motion and I just checked with Ali.

I believe we can still adjourn.

I'm not sure.

I would if if it's of any consequence I would prefer that we vote on this item and I okay if you guys are done how to do this let's do this.

I do want to respond quickly though because I'm okay quickly measure.

I appreciate you all want to do this quickly, but I will say, Chair Mosqueda, I have taken very little time up in this meeting.

I get it, I know, go ahead.

Other council members, so I don't appreciate constantly being told to do that quickly.

I'm doing as quickly as possible.

Council Member Gonzalez said that this amendment presupposes that the current system is broken.

Yes, it absolutely is premised on the overwhelming fact that the current system is absolutely broken.

And that is not my personal opinion as a socialist.

This is something that has been widely recognized by a vast majority of people.

In fact, my observation from having talked to hundreds of people about the demand to defund the police is that many people who don't agree with defunding the police actually strongly agree that yes, there need to be strong accountability system and that the current system is simply not working.

So I'm not clear why that is a bad thing.

That is actually the reality that this amendment is premised on.

And the language in the amendment is, as I explained earlier in great detail, is along the lines of many ballot measures.

And I also said I am open to adjustments in that language if you want to make them more consistent with some of the ballot measures that have already been passed by other cities.

So this is, again, this is not my opinion.

This is something that is being reimagined, if you want to use that word, by tens of thousands of ordinary people and activists in many other cities.

So Seattle won't even be the first on this.

So I do not agree with these insinuations from Council Member Gonzalez that this is all somehow my opinion and this is my plan and that it'll be so terrible if the council votes on this.

I mean, if your opinion is that the current system is somehow working, then, you know, that's your opinion and your vote will reflect that.

But I just wanted to make it clear that this amendment is in no shape or form based on any personal opinions or biases that my office has.

It is absolutely based on the fact on the ground that the current system is broken, that we need something better.

And if council members don't agree with this, and this amendment loses the vote tonight, then I would really welcome other council members to give their alternatives to how they would reimagine and actually accomplish police accountability.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you so much.

Clarification I think is warranted.

Number one, I was not limiting anybody's time.

The fact that I was willing to suspend this till tomorrow offered additional time for discussion.

Number two, it is my understanding that I believed that this item here was going to be a request to law to work on that drafting and the research question.

And I think that the question about how we make this in tandem with the central staff's work, wanting to recognize that central staff would be involved was part of what I suggested.

So I hope I did not complicate things in that way.

I do think the intent to make sure that law has the opportunity to research this as any other council office would put as part of their work plan, it just was lifting up this item to make sure that I am supportive of it.

I am supportive of it.

I think it is a matter of the right placement for this in a work plan and among our partnership with law.

Will the clerk please call the roll on law 002A001.

Lewis?

No.

Morales?

No.

Sawant?

Yes.

Peterson?

No.

Juarez?

No.

Strauss?

No.

Herbold?

No.

Gonzalez?

No.

Chair Mosqueda?

No.

One in favor, eight opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion does not carry.

And we will move on since we have one last technical item.

And I think folks are anxious to get this wrapped up to the last item here.

Council Member Strauss, I'm gonna go ahead and move this in front of us so that you can move your amendment.

I move approval of Council Bill SPD-016B-001 included in voting group B consent package.

Is there a second?

Second.

It's been moved and seconded.

Is there any comments or amendments?

Council Member Strauss, you are recognized to move your substitute.

Thank you.

After, so we moved it.

So after the second, Oh yep here we go.

I move to amend SPD-016-B-001 to add the following to the end of the first sentence in the budget action description or quote or community safety and communications center period end quote.

Do I have a is there a second.

Second.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Please continue if there's any additional clarification that's needed and we can also turn it over to central staff to walk us through the difference.

Oh, just that the Community Safety and Communication Center may be the right place to move some of these duties of the Harbor Patrol rather than the Fire Department.

I think that it's important to analyze both departments.

For instance, in Santa Monica, their harbor unit is a civilian unit responsible for all public safety on Santa Monica Pier.

It's staffed 24 hours a day.

And they respond to a variety of water and pure beach related calls, including lifeguarding, scuba diving, EMT, rescue boat operations.

And they have firefighting capabilities.

So just realizing much like the community service officers that we have here in the city that The police department might not be the right place.

Department of Neighborhoods isn't the right place.

Maybe it's the Community Safety and Communication Center.

So just wanted to have both of those departments analyzed.

Great.

And I see Greg available.

Greg, is there any additional clarification you'd like to offer before we open it up for additional comments and questions on the substitute?

No, I don't have any additional clarification.

Are we looking at the sum of all the changes here then?

Yes.

OK.

None.

I think that's all I have to say.

≫ Okay.

Great.

Thank you.

Are there additional Councilmembers who would like to offer comments?

Councilmember Peterson, please go ahead.

≫ Thank you, Chair Mosqueda and thank you, Councilmember Strauss for bringing this forward.

Harbor Patrol is mainly located in District 4, actually, but it serves all of Lake Union, Lake Washington, and beyond.

I think it is important to note that we are doing a lot of work on this.

We are surveying a lot of our districts from the waterways.

They do important work.

I believe that this report may show that it is difficult to reallocate some of these responsibilities.

I will be curious as to what the results are of this.

I am in favor of getting more data.

I just want to thank Councilmember Strauss for bringing this forward and really digging into this particular element of our reimagining public safety efforts here.

I appreciate the expertise that he's working on developing related to Harbor Patrol.

And just, I think it's just a really great example of how we are all working together as a council to really I think it is important for us to figure out police department, policing is a big thing for the city.

And it doesn't, the responsibility for moving policy reform in that area doesn't sit with one Councilmember who happens to be the chair of that committee.

So really enjoy the partnership that we have all experienced.

Yeah, thank you all.

One of the things that I've heard loud and clear about Harbor Patrol, who I benefit from as well as a kayak or myself, is that they do proactive patrolling rather than being simply reactive.

And so that is one of the most important items for me to see retained as we provide a consistent and or expanded level of service on our freshwater ways here in the city.

Excellent.

Well, thank you again for pulling this out and offering that clarifying amendment here.

I don't see any additional comments or questions.

This is our last thing we're going to do today, folks.

I'm going to try to get it right.

We have before us the substitute.

And if you could scroll up just a tiny bit for me here, Patty, before I request the clerk to call the roll on the motion to substitute, I want to remind council members that a yes or an aye vote is a exception of the desire to include the substitute in a moment.

A no vote is a rejection of the substitute and the desire to retain the version on the agenda for final consideration.

So again, we're voting on the motion to substitute.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll to substitute?

Lewis.

Aye.

Morales.

Yes.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

Yes.

Juarez.

Aye.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold?

Yes.

Gonzalez?

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda?

Yes.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

The motion carries and substitute SPD-016B-001 is now before us.

Are there any additional comments?

I am not seeing any.

Madam Clerk, will you please call the roll on the approval of SPD-016B-001?

Lewis.

Aye.

Morales.

Yes.

Sawant.

Yes.

Peterson.

Yes.

Juarez.

Aye.

Strauss.

Yes.

Herbold.

Yes.

Gonzalez.

Yes.

Chair Mosqueda.

Aye.

Yes.

Nine in favor, none opposed.

Madam Clerk, thank you very much.

The motion carries and SBD 016B001 is approved.

Okay, that got us through all of the items that were pulled from our form, from our group B discussions.

I appreciate the dialogue.

I've learned quite a bit from our back and forth today, so thank you.

Thank you very much, colleagues.

Thank you, central staff for being available.

We are going to continue items on our agenda tomorrow.

The continuation will consider items pending on today's agenda.

We will take up again our discussion at 9 30 tomorrow morning with items in group C.

Excellent.

I'm not hearing any questions.

A huge round of appreciation for a round of applause and appreciation for everyone who has stuck it out with us for this long meeting.

Apologies for going over about a half an hour.

Enjoy your evening.

If there's no further questions, today's meeting is adjourned.

See you tomorrow at 9.30.

Public comments line up at 7, 8.